I hope this isn’t a dream!
by gaarafangirl91
Summary: Two friends on their way to a local tournament find themselves inexplicably in the Yu-Gi-Oh universe. How will they react to the changes in the plot, and how will the characters react to them? Contains humor inspired by Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series.
1. Chapter 1

**Hey guys, I decided to creat****e a fanfic about one of my favorite animes, Yu-Gi-Oh!!!**

**Don't worry, this does not mean that my other fic will be abandoned, quite the contrary; I am now working on the next chappie and it's almost done!!! It should come out sometime in the next couple of days, after I have gotten all my tests out of the way…**

**Quick author's note: in this fic, my OC's name is Nina. She's 17, a HUGE fan of Yu-Gi-Oh (and Yu-Gi-Oh Abridged), she has dark brown eyes and dark brown hair that reached her waist (kinda like Ryou's). Also, she loves to play Duel Monsters, and often participates in tournaments. I have another OC, but he will appear later in this chappie. Also, since they're both big fans of YGOTAS, expect a lot of quotes from them.**

**Now, on with the story!!!!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh or Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series. I do, however, own my OC's in this story, Nina and Brian.**

**Chapter 1**

**Nina's POV**

"Hurry up, honey, or you're gonna be late!!!!"

"Coming, mom!!"

"_Finally, the big day is here!!" _I thought. _"The day where I get to try out my most recent deck against other duelists in the city's tournament!!! And all of that for the most awesome prize ever!! A never-before released card!!!!"_

I quickly got dressed (I decided to wear a pair of blue jeans and dark grey t-shirt, with the design of that resembled the Change of Heart angel), grabbed my phone, my mp3 player, my deck, and I put my lucky charm: a black pendant, with the picture of my favorite Duel Monster: the Blue Eyes White Dragon.

Just as I was about to head downstairs, my phone began to ring.

"Hello?"

"_Hey, you ready or what? I've been waiting forever!!!"_

"I'm almost done! We'll be there if fifteen minutes, I promise!"

"_You better!"_

I smiled and headed downstairs, towards the kitchen, where I saw my parents having breakfast.

"Ready for today?"

"You bet!" I said, smiling. It took me a long time, but I finally managed to convince my parents to let me participate in Duel monsters tournaments.

"Well, whenever you're ready, come outside. I'll go and get the car ready."

"Ok mom." I said, while eating my meal. When I was done, I said goodbye to my dad, and walked over to the car. "Hey mom, don't forget we have to pick up Brian!"

"I haven't forgotten."

Fifteen minutes later, we were in front of a medium-sized white house.

"C'mon, or we're gonna be late!!!!" I said, blowing the horn on the car.

"Coming!" said a teen boy, who was around 17 years old, had brown hair and brown eyes. He also had a red T-shirt that had the design of a black dragon on it, and deep blue jeans. Around his neck he wore his lucky charm: a pendant similar to mine, except it was of his favorite Duel Monster: the Red Eyes Black Dragon.

"Hey, Brian!"

"Hey! You ready to kick some butt at the tournament today?" he asked with a smile.

"Hell yeah! This event is gonna be super special awesome!!" I said, and we both bust out laughing. My mom just looked at us, shook her head and drove to the arena.

When we got there, my mom said her goodbyes, wished us both good luck and took off.

"Well, we have half an hour until the tournament starts… wanna play a card game?" asked Brian, feeling kinda bored.

"What, and give away my new cards? No way!! Besides, I got some really powerful ones, including the one I've been searching forever!!!" I told my friend, grinning from ear to ear.

"You mean you finally managed to get it?"

"It took some effort, but yeah!!!! I just hope it's OK to use it in tournaments…" I said, lowering my head. I hadn't had time to confirm if my prized card was allowed in official competitions.

"Don't worry. I'm sure it'll be fine."

"Yeah, you're probably…" I said, looking over his shoulder, but stopping as soon as I saw who was behind him.

"Hey, you OK?"

"Brian, look!"

Brian turned around and saw a young man, around our age, with white hair that went to the middle of his back, blue jeans and a light blue coat. The young man hadn't noticed us.

"So?"

"So?!? I didn't know you could wear cosplays to these events! If I knew, I would have come prepared!"

"Yeah, you could have dressed as Bakura!" He said, laughing his head off.

"Hey, it's not my fault he's my favorite character!" I said, blushing bright red. "Besides, you probably would have chosen to come has Yugi, or Joey!"

"BROOKLYN RAGE!!!"

I started laughing at his little outburst, but then got an idea.

"Let's see if there are anymore cosplayers around!"

Brian pondered on the idea for a moment. "Well, we DO have some time to kill…"

"That's the spirit! C'mon!!" I said, practically dragging him behind me. When we got to the place where we had spotted the cosplayer, we saw the he had disappeared.

"OK, that's weird…"

Suddenly, a bright light started to surround us, blinding us, and before we knew what had happened, everything had gone black.

After what felt like hours I slowly opened my eyes, trying to adjust them to the blinding light, only to close them again, which caused my already throbbing head to hurt even more.

"Oh, man… did someone get the number of that truck?" I said, trying to sit up, and noticing that I was in some kind of bed. Sitting up fully, and finally managing to keep my headache under control, I looked around, to see that I was in a hospital room.

It was a considerably large room, big enough to accommodate two patients, plus several visitors. The walls were all painted white, and there was another bed next to mine. On the other end of the room, there was a TV. On the bed slept Brian.

"Brian, wake up!!!"

"But, mom, I don't want to go to school today!!!" He said, turning away from me and trying to fall asleep again.

"Wake up, you moron! You don't have to go to school."

He turned over, opening one eye lazily. "Great, then please let me sleep, because I have a major headache!" he said, closing his eyes again.

I sighed, but then grinned as an idea sparked in my head. "Holy shit, dude! Someone took your deck and decided to burn the cards!!" _"3, 2…"_ I thought.

"WHAT!!!!!!" he said, sitting up immediately and looking around frenetically. _"Wow that was quick_!" I said, trying to hold back the laughter. He noticed that and looked at me.

"Relax; nothing happened to your deck." I reassured him, pointing to the table next to him, where all his stuff was.

"Why did you do that? You almost gave me a heart attack!"

"Sorry, but it was the best way I could think of to wake you."

"Why?"

"Look around you. From the looks of it, we're in a hospital."

His head snapped right back. "Say what?!? How? And why?"

As if on cue, a doctor came in, saw us and smiled. "Oh good, you're awake! We were starting to wonder when you two would come to."

"What happened, doc?"

"Well, we were kinda hopping one of you could shed some light on that subject for us. It seems that a young man found you two passed out in the middle of the park, and called an ambulance. He's right outside, if you want to see him…"

I looked over at Brian, who nodded. "Sure, doc."

"Very well, please wait a minute, and we'll be right back."

The doctor then exited the room, only to come back with a young man that looked strangely familiar.

My eyes widen in shock, when I realized that it was my favorite Yu-Gi-Oh character, Bakura Ryou. _"There's no away that it can be him!!!"_ I thought, and quickly looked at Brian, who looked just as surprised as me._ "OK, so it's not the effect of the bump to the head, seeing as he's seeing the same as me_…"

"Hello. My name is Ryou." he said, extending his hand. Nervously, I shook it, still unable to believe what I was seeing. He then did the same to Brian, who was trying to see if this was all some kind of trick, or possibly an effect of the medication.

"I'll be right back. I'll give you all some time to catch up, and then I'll come back to run some tests."

Me and Brian just nodded, still too shocked to say anything. The doctor then left, and Ryou looked back at us.

"Oh, sorry. We didn't even introduce ourselves. My name is Nina and this" I said, pointing to my friend. "is my friend Brian."

"Pleased to meet you." Ryou said, smiling.

"So you're the one who found us?"

"Yeah. Well, me and my friends. We were walking through the park when one of us saw you two passed out. We then called for an ambulance. They couldn't come now, but they said they would try to stop by later. They got really worried."

We just nodded, trying to take all this in.

The doctor came in at that moment, taking his chart and looking at Ryou.

"Sorry, but the visiting hours are over for now. You can come back later, if you'd like."

Ryou nodded in understanding. "If that's OK with them, me and my friends will stop by later."

We nodded, and with that Ryou left, and we got ready for all the tests that the doctor was going to do to us.

Once he was done, he left the room, giving me and Brian some time to think things over.

"How do you think we got here?" asked Brian, looking at me.

"You heard Ryou…"

"Not that! I mean how did we get here, in the Yu-Gi-Oh world!!! In Domino city!" he asked, looking outside the window. "This place isn't even supposed to existed, but…"

"Oh c'mon!! You can't say that you're not happy that we're here!"

"I am, but, still…"

"Look, I'm just as confused as you are, but don't worry. We'll find a way to get back home! Besides, who says that we can't have some fun in the meantime?" I said, smirking.

Brian looked at me. "What do you mean?"

"We're in the best place possible! And we have our decks with us, jam packed with powerful cards!"

"Yeah, that we were going to use in the tournament back home…"

"Well, we can still use them. All we gotta do is ask Ryou and the gang if there any tournaments around, and we can enter them, and face the best opponents around!!"

"Sounds good!" said Brian laying back down on his bed, and getting his deck.

"_I can't believe my dream finally came true."_ I thought, as I lay back down too. _"One thing is for sure, though… I hope this isn't a dream!"_

**Well, that was chapter one. I hope you all liked it.**

**Oh, and one more thing I forgot to mention: in this fic, whenever I'm talking about Bakura, I'll call him Ryou, but if I'm referring to his Yami, he will be called Bakura. Just a little heads-up. **

**Cookies to anyone who reviews!! ^___^**


	2. Chapter 2

**Hi everyone!!! I'm back with the next chapter****!! Now, first off, I would like to thank my good friends Evil BlackRose Of Doom and Shinka-chan, who helped me a lot with this fic!!! You guys rock!!!! ^__^**

**And I also want to than everyone who read, reviewed, and favorited this fic!!! **

**One last thing: every time Nina and Brian mention the Rare Hunters, if they want to mock them, they will mostly refer to them as "Steves".**

**And, just to let you know, this story from now on will follow the anime, with parts of the Japanese version and with parts of the English dub, with only slight changes, so there may be some spoilers. **

**Anywayz, on with show!!!!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh or Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series. I do, however, own my OC's in this story, Nina and Brian.**

**Chapter 2**

After doing some thinking, and going through my deck out of pure boredom, I turned to my friend.

"Hey Brian?"

"Yeah?"

"_When _do you think we are?"

He stopped browsing through his own deck and turned to look at me. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, when do you think we've landed? Do you think we're before the show started, after the show ended …?"

"Well, judging by Ryou's clothes, I'd say we're at the very least on the beginning of the second season…" He said, sitting upright.

"Battle City, cool…"

"But I guess the very best way to find out is to ask them about the tournaments."

I nodded and went back to my deck.

After a couple a couple of minutes, we started to hear voices outside of our hospital room, and Ryou along with his group of friends came in.

"Hi guys!!"

"Hey Ryou!" I said smiling.

"Oh, right. These are my friends, Joey" said Ryou, pointing to a tall teenager, who was wearing a blue and white shirt, and blue pants. "Tristan" he then pointed to teenager about the same height as Joey, with brown hair, who was wearing a black coat, with a grey shirt underneath and dark gray pants. "Tea" he then pointed to a girl with brown hair, with a light green shirt and dark blue shorts. "And Yugi". He pointed to the shortest of the group, who had tricolored hair that shot in all directions, had a white shirt on, under a blue jacket and blue pants. On his neck he had the Millennium Puzzle, strapped securely in a chain.

"Hi, my name is Nina, and this is my friend Brian."

"So, how are you guys feeling?" asked Yugi.

"A lot better, but we still don't know what happened to us." said Brian.

"Well, we're just glad you guys are alright. You gave us quite a scare!"

"Are you guys new here? I don't think we've ever seen you two around…"

"Oh, yeah!! We're just visiting from another city! We heard that Domino was the place to go if you were looking for a good duel!" I said.

"Oh, so you're duelists?" asked Yugi.

"Yep!" I said, pointing to my deck, which was on the table next to me and to Brian's deck.

"Well, then, you should enter this new tournament that just got announced by KaibaCorp!" said Yugi.

I immediately looked at Brian and I knew that he was thinking the same thing as me. _"We're in the Battle City arc!"_

"Yeah, but to enter, you need to register in a shop and receive a Duel Disk." said Joey.

"We can go there with you both. We need to get Joey's and Yugi's Duel Disks too." said

Tristan.

"What about you? Don't you two duel?" asked Brian.

"Only for fun, it's only Joey and Yugi that like to compete…"

"What about you, Ryou?" I asked.

Ryou blushed, "Oh, I don't usually duel… I have a deck, but…"

"Aw, come on, it could be fun!"

"Well, I suppose I could give it a shot…"

"Alright, Ryou!!!" everyone started cheering for Ryou. At that point, the doctor came in to see us, and told us that we were fine, and could now leave the hospital.

We left, and headed to the nearest card game shop, to get our Duel Disks. Just then, a thought crossed my mind, and I turned to everyone.

"Hey guys, you mind if I just discuss something with Brian? It's really quick."

"Sure."

I pulled Brian a couple of feet away and he stared at me.

"What's up?"

"I just remembered! The guy in the card game shop… he's a Steve."

"So?

"So, he's gonna tell Marik about our rarest cards."

"How can he? Does Kaiba even have info on us in the KaibaCorp database?"

"I dunno… maybe. Right now, we exist in this world; I guess it _is _possible that some sort of information got into his computer…"

We just looked at each other, trying to figure out what to do.

"So, what? Should we continue to the card game shop either way?" I asked my friend.

"Well, like you said, we came here to participate in a card game tournament, and that's what we'll do!" he said, grinning from hear to ear.

"Right. Let's go!" I said, and together with Brian, raced back to the group.

"So, are you guys ready?" asked Yugi.

"Yup. Let's go get those Duel Disks!"

We continued on our way towards the game shop. When we arrived there, the shop owner greeted us.

"So, what can I do for you kids?"

"We want to sign up for the Battle City tournament." said Yugi.

"Very well, just tell me your names, and I'll enter them in the KaibaCorp database. If you have a ranking of four stars or more, you get a free Duel Disk."

"My name is Yugi Motou."

"Alright, let's see: your ranking is of five stars. Here you go, kid." The shop keeper said, handing Yugi a box containing his Duel Disk.

Then Joey decided to get his Duel Disk. "What about me? The name's Joey Wheeler!"

"Sorry, kid, but it says here that your ranking is only of one star." I almost burst out laughing at Joey's priceless expression. He looked like he wanted to punch someone, and I knew who that someone was.

While Joey was screaming about Kaiba cheating him out of the competition, I noticed the shop keeper watch his computer screen, and type in a few code words.

"Oh, I'm very sorry. There must have been some sort of glitch in the system. Your ranking is of four stars. Here you go." he said, handing over a Duel Disk to Joey.

"Hell yeah! I knew it was only the stupid computer that got it wrong…"

"Anyone else wants to sign up?""

"Uhm… yes, my friend Nina and me. My name is Brian."

He typed our names in his computer. "Ah yes. It says here that you are also rated four stars. Here you go!" He said, giving us our Duel Disks.

"Wow!! Man, I had no idea that you guys were that tough to beat!" said Tristan.

I just turned to Brian, who was also speechless. "_I can't believe that the computer recognized us as duelists."_ I thought.

"Maybe I should step down… it looks like this is gonna be full of tough duelists…" said Ryou, unsure.

"Hey, you can't give up like that! Who knows, maybe we will all make it into the finals!!!" I said.

"Yeah, Ryou, at least try… You could end up having lots of fun!"

Ryou blushed, and nodded. "Ok… If you all think I should try, then I will!" He turned to the shop keeper. "My name is Ryou Bakura."

Once again, the shop keeper typed the name in the computer. "Four stars… here you go, kid."

The group stood in awe as Ryou accepted his Duel Disk.

"Man, we never knew that Ryou could duel to that level…"

We then exited the store, and when he was sure we we're out of earshot, the shop keeper picked up his phone and dialed a number. "Send in the Rare Hunters. The boy with the Red Eyes Black Dragon just left."

Once outside, Joey stared at his newly acquired Duel Disk. "Man, I can't wait to face all those other duelists!"

"But, Joey, remember, this technology is pretty new. Before you go out there, challenging everyone, you should take some time to get used to Kaiba's new Duel Disk System." said Yugi.

"Man, you're right! The last time I tried dueling anyone with Kaiba's old Duel Disks, it cost me the match! But how can I practice?"

Inside, I started to smile. _"Now's my chance…"_

"Hey, Joey, what do you say to a duel? Just so we can get used to these new systems."

"Are you sure?" asked Joey. I simply nodded, taking my Duel disk from the box. "Sweet! Let's do it!!"

I smirked, and attached the Duel Disk to my arm, while Joey did the same.

"I'll start! I'll set a card face down and play Pot of Greed." I drew two more cards. "And I Summon Muka Muka in Attack Mode!" I placed my card in the Duel Disk, and a hologram of my monster appeared in front of me. _"Cool!"_

"Ah, that monster only has 600 ATK points! It's too weak!!" Joey laughed.

"Look again, Joey."

"What- how is that possible?!" He asked, seeing my monster's attack points suddenly rise from the previous 600 to 2400.

"My Muka Muka is an effect monster. For each card on my hand, it gains 300 Attack and Defense points, and since I have 6…" I said, smirking. "Your move."

"Man, that's gonna be tough to beat…" Joey stated, drawing his card. "I summon my Panther Warrior in Attack Mode, and I play the Spell Card Scapegoat!" He placed the card in his Duel Disk, and four sheep appeared. "Now I play my Spell Card Graceful Dice!" A hologram of a cherub holding a blue die appeared and rolled it. "C'mon… Yeah!!" Joey said, as the die revealed the number 5. "Now my Panther Warrior has enough points to send your monster packin'! I sacrifice one of the scapegoats! Panther Warrior, attack!!"

Joey's monster jumped in the air and slashed his sword through my Muka Muka, destroying it, and causing my life points to fall to 3900.

"Nice move, Joey, but don't think you'll have a lot more opportunities like that… My turn!! I place one monster face down, and end my turn."

"What happened? Did your luck run out?" said Joey, drawing another card. "I summon Alligator Sword in Attack Mode. Now, Alligator Sword, attack that face down monster!" His Alligator Sword slashed through my monster, which was a Sangan, and it disappeared.

"Now I activate my Sangan's special effect, and I chose one monster from my Deck with an ATK power of 1500 or less!"

"Oh boy…" Brian said, realizing my strategy.

"What?" asked Ryou.

"I know what she's gonna do. She used this move in a duel against me once. Let's just say that this is gonna be good…"

The others turned their attention back to the duel, where Joey was making his next move. "And now sacrifice another scapegoat so my Panther Warrior can attack you directly!"

Another scapegoat disappeared from the field, and the monster lunged at me, dropping my life points to 1900 with its attack. "My turn is over."

"Good, because that means that the real fight can now begin!" I said, drawing another card from my deck. "Now, I play Cyber-Stein, in Attack mode! And I activate the Spell Card Dian Keto the Cure Master, which allows me to recover 1000 life points. Now, I activate Cyber-Stein's special ability!"

"What special ability?" asked Joey, looking confused.

"By giving up 2500 of my life points, I can Summon to the field a Fusion monster, without needing to use the monsters needed to do the fusion, and without the use of a Polymerization card." (**A.N: I know that, in reality, the cost for this card effect to work is 5000. But, since the life points in the beginning of the duel were cut in half, I thought it would be fair to do the same with this card cost.) **"Now, I summon my Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon!"

"No way!!"

"And I activate my face down card, Axe of Despair, and attach it to my Cyber-Stein! Now, Cyber-Stein, attack Alligator Sword!" My monster then attacked Joey's beast, destroying it and bringing his life points to 3900. "Your turn."

"C'mon, Joey, stay calm…" he said, while looking at his deck. "I set a monster in defense mode. And I attack your Cyber-Stein with my Panther-Warrior!" Once again, his monster attacked mine, destroying it and leaving me with 100 life points. "I'm done."

"In that case, my turn! I summon Mechanicalchaser in attack mode, and I attack your scapegoat! And now, Blue Eyes, attack Panther Warrior, with Neutron Blast!!"

My Dragon shot three beams, which hit their mark and decreased Joey's life points to a total of 1400. "And finally, I place one card face down. Your turn, Joey."

"Please, give me a good card…" He said, looking at his newly draw card through his barely open eyes. "Yes!! I activate my Polymerization card, and fuse my Baby Dragon, who's on the field, and my Time Wizard, to create Thousand Dragon! Now, attack the Mechanicalchaser!"

"I don't think so, Joey! I activate my Trap card, Negate Attack!"

"Fine, then I guess my turn is over…"

"Cool. Blue Eyes, destroy Thousand Dragon with your Neutron Blast!" Once again, the Blue Eyes shot its attack, ad Joey's life points hit zero.

"Hey, you won!!"

"Congratulations!"

"Thanks, but really, Joey was an excellent opponent, for a minute there, I thought I was really gonna lose!" I said.

"Really nice match, Nina! I can't wait until I get my rematch!" Joey said, extending his hand.

"Maybe you'll get it in the finals!" I said, shaking his hand.

"Hump… I doubt that that mutt can even get pass the first round of the tournament!!"

We turned around to see Seto Kaiba, staring at us, but more specifically, at me.

**What could Seto Kaiba want from our group? Find out in the next chapter!!!**

**By the way, I'm kinda new to writing Yu-Gi-Oh fics, so I don't know if the way I wrote the duel was okay. So, if you want to make any comments about it, like if it was too long, or with too many descriptions, don't hesitate to say so in the review!!!! Thanks for reading!!!!**


	3. Chapter 3

**Hi, guys!!! ****Sorry for taking so long on getting this next chapter out, but duels are really a pain to write… Anyways, it's here, so enjoy!!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh or Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series. I do, however, own my OC's in this story, Nina and Brian.**

**Chapter 3**

Joey stared at Kaiba, ready to punch him. "What did you say?"

"Joey, cut it out!" said Tristan, trying to restrain his friend.

Kaiba paid him no mind. "I didn't come here to deal with you, Wheeler. I came here for a much bigger prize."

The Millennium Puzzle began to glow and Yami suddenly appeared.

"And what would that be, Kaiba?"

Kaiba then pointed at me. "I came for her Blue Eyes."

"_Now where have I seen this before?"_ I thought, looking at Kaiba.

"I am willing to trade any amount of cards for it." He said, showing us a briefcase filled with rare cards.

"Sorry, but the Blue Eyes isn't up for trade."

"I don't know… remember what Kaiba did to Yugi's Grandpa?" Brian whispered.

"Yeah, but what can I do? I can't just give him my Blue Eyes, I worked hard to find that card!" I whispered back.

"Unless… You were to duel him. There's no way he'd say no to that!"

I looked at my friend. "Have you lost your mind? He's got three Blue Eyes White Dragons in his deck, plus Obelisk!!! I can't compete with that!" I whispered, nearly panicking.

"Relax, all you have to do is keep the amount of monsters on his side of the field to a bare minimum!" he said, grinning.

"Easy for you to say…" I replied, but decided to follow his idea nonetheless. _"I must be suicidal…" _

"Hey, Kaiba! How about we make a deal?

Kaiba turned to us, clearly interested. "What do you have in mind?"

"How about a duel?"

Everyone gasped at the idea.

"Don't do it!!" said Tea. "Kaiba will do anything to get his hands on that card. He once kidnapped Yugi's Grandpa, just so he could get it." Yami nodded.

"Guys, it's OK. I'll win, don't worry!" I said, and then I turned to Kaiba. "So, what's your answer?"

Kaiba smirked at the thought of the duel. "Very well, but don't expect me to go easy on you. That Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon will be mine!" He said, taking out his Duel Disk and activating it.

"I'll go first!" said Kaiba, setting a card on his Duel Disk. "I summon Hitotsu-Me Giant, in Attack mode! Your turn…"

"If you insist… I summon Whiptail Crow in Attack mode! Attack Hitotsu-Me Giant!!!" My Whiptail Crow launched its attack at Kaiba's monster, destroying it, and dropping his life points to 3550. "And I set two cards face down."

"Then I summon Battle Ox!!! Destroy that monster!" The Battle Ox obeyed, and my life points were now 3950. "And I also set two cards face down."

"In that case, I special summon my Gilasaurus!"

"Can she do that?" Joey asked, looking at the dinosaur that had appeared in front of me.

"Yes. Gilasaurus is an effect monster. Its effect allows her to special summon it, instead of using a normal summon, allowing her to summon more than one monster in that turn. But it comes with a price. If Nina chooses to activate this effect, her opponent can then select a monster from his Graveyard and summon it." explained Yami.

Kaiba smirked and reached for a button on his Duel Disk. "It was a big mistake giving me an opportunity like that! I chose my Hitotsu-Me Giant!" The green monster returned to the field, and joined Battle Ox. "Now I can activate my trap card! Ring of destruction! It allows me to chose one monster on the field, and destroy it, giving damage to both players' Life Points equal to the attack points of the selected monster! And I chose your Gilasaurus!!" The trap card revealed a ring with flames around it, which attached itself to my monster, and destroyed it, dropping Kaiba's life points to 2150, and mine to 2550.

"_In that case, time for plan B!"_ I thought, picking up a card from my hand. "I summon Sangan, in defense mode!!"

"That pathetic creature won't save you!!! I activate Polymerization and fuse my Battle Ox with my Mystic Horseman from my hand to summon the Rabid Horseman! Now, Hitotsu-Me Giant, attack that fur ball!" My Sangan was suddenly destroyed, leaving me open for an attack. "And I activate my face down card, Quick Attack, which allows my Rabid Horseman to attack the turn it was summoned. Attack her directly!"

I cringed as the huge creature hit me with its axe, dropping my life points to 550.

"That Blues Eyes is almost within my reach!!" said Kaiba, laughing at the way the duel was turning out.

"It's not over yet! My turn!! Since you sent my Sangan to the Graveyard, I can activate its effect and select one monster from my deck and had it to my hand!!" I searched through my deck until I found the card I was looking for.

"Using that strategy again, are you? Unless you can't count, you should know that Cyber-Stein's effect can't be activated unless you can pay the correct amount of Life Points, which you can't!!! So just give up!!"

"I never give up! And besides…" I said, smirking. "Who said I was looking for Cyber-Stein? I have something that's a lot better! I summon to the field Kaibaman!"

Kaiba couldn't believe what he was witnessing. This monster looked exactly like him, right down to the coat he had on. The only difference was that Kaibaman had a helmet on that was shaped like a Blue Eyes White Dragon, and had long red hair.

"Is this some kind of joke?" He asked.

"Trust me, I'm very serious."

On the sideline, I could hear Joey trying to hold back his laughter. "Man, I never thought that a monster that was supposed to represent Kaiba could be so weak. It only has 200 ATK points!"

"It's not how many ATK points it has, but what it can do." I replied.

"What is that supposed to mean?" asked Kaiba, who was obviously furious that such a card existed, and that it was, in his opinion, so weak.

"This card has a cool ability. If I tribute Kaibaman, I can summon a specific card from my hand. And I think you're very familiar with it." After sending Kaibaman to the Graveyard, I raised a card into the air, before slamming it down on my Duel Disk. "Come forth, Blue Eyes White Dragon!!"

Everyone stood in awe, as the dragon appeared and let out a roar, blue eyes staring at its opponents.

"It's impossible…" I heard Kaiba mutter.

"Oh, trust me, it's possible. Blue Eyes White Dragon, attack the Rabid Horseman!!"

The dragon complied, opening its mouth to launch a ray of energy that struck Kaiba's monster and destroyed it, bringing his life points down to 1150. "Your move…" I said, smirking at the expression of shock that Kaiba had.

Kaiba now had a very serious expression, and now I knew that he meant business. "I'm through playing around! I play Cost Down, and decrease the level of all the monsters in my hand by two levels. Then I play Soul Exchange!!"

"What does that do?" asked Ryou.

"It allows Kaiba to pick one of the monsters his opponent controls and tribute it as if he was controlling it. But he can't attack this turn if he plays that card." explained Brian.

"That's right, and I select your Blue Eyes to summon my own!!" My dragon soon disappeared, and Kaiba's Blue Eyes White Dragon appeared instead, on his side of the field.

"Losing my turn to attack is a very small price to pay, because your card will soon be mine!!!" he laughed.

"_Ok, it's now or never…"_ I thought, as I drew another card. I looked at it, and smiled. "Looks like you lose, Kaiba."

"What?"

I glanced at Ryou before playing my next card. "I play Change of Heart! And I chose to take control of your Blue Eyes!" The Change of Heart angel appeared and flew towards Kaiba's Blue Eyes. "Now, attack Hitotsu-Me Giant!!"

Kaiba looked on in terror as his most prized monster turned and attacked his Hitotsu-Me Giant, making his life points reach 0.

"Yeah!!! You won!!!" shouted Joey, coming to congratulate me.

"See? I told you there was nothing to worry about!" said Brian, grinning and giving me a high-five.

"Yeah, well, if it wasn't for the Change of Heart, I probably would have lost…"

"How did you get a Blue Eyes? I thought that the only ones that existed were the three that belong to Kaiba, and the one that my Grandpa had." said Yami, looking curious.

"_Oh, man, that's right. This Blue Eyes isn't supposed to exist!!"_ Internally, I started to panic, but quickly came up with an answer. "I won it in a tournament a couple of months ago, along with Kaibaman. It was limited edition, made especially for the winner."

Kaiba finally recovered from the shock, and glared angrily at us. "This is not over. That Blue Eyes White Dragon will be mine!! And I won't stop until it is in my hands!!"

"Care to say that to our faces?" said Joey, trying once again to brake free from Tristan's grip and give Kaiba a piece of his mind, but the latter just ignored him, turned away and left.

After he had calmed down, Joey facepalmed. "Oh man, I almost forgot!!! My sister's operation is tomorrow, and I'm supposed to meet her at the hospital!! I gotta go, guys!!!" He then said his goodbyes and took off, disappearing down the street where we were.

"I hope Joey will be alright…" said Tristan, as he watched his friend disappear in the distance.

"Why is that?"

"His mom is gonna be at the hospital too for Serenity's operation, and ever since she and Joey got separated, Joey hasn't spoken to his mother."

"But I swear that one day, the Wheeler family will be reunited!!!" Tristan continued, with tears in his eyes.

The Millennium Puzzle glowed again, and Yugi appeared once again. He looked at Tristan with disbelief. "Are you sure that you're not just saying that because you want to impress Serenity?"

Tristan almost lost his balance and fell after that comment, causing us laugh at his reaction.

Yugi then turned to us. "Well, it's getting pretty late, so I guess we should be heading home too."

"Oh, damn…"

"What is it?" asked Ryou.

"I forgot. We arrived in Domino today! We don't have anywhere to stay!!!" said Brian.

"Do you guys know anyplace where we can stay?"

"Well, if you guys want, I guess I could ask my Grandpa, I'm sure he doesn't mind!" offered Yugi.

"We really didn't want to cause any trouble… We just needed a small place for ourselves…"

"Well, there's a house in my building that's unoccupied." said Ryou.

"I guess that's our best choice, so we'll take it!"

"Are you sure about this?" Brian whispered.

"What's the worst that can happen?" he raised an eyebrow at my question. "Relax, that won't happen!"

He seemed to want to reply, but the prospect of having a roof over his head defeated all his arguments. "It's a good solution, even if just temporary." He said, shrugging.

"Great, so it's settled! See you guys tomorrow!" We said your goodbyes to Yugi, Tristan and Tea and headed on the opposite direction with Ryou.

For a while, we just walked in silence, until we reached the building where Ryou lived.

"I just need to talk to the person in charge, to try and see if the house is still available." he said, entering a house on the ground floor. After a few moments, he came back out, with a smile on his face and handed us a key. "It's alright. He said that you two could go tonight."

"Sweet!!"

"Thanks, Ryou!" I said, hugging him. He blushed slightly at the sudden action.

"Well, just follow me and I'll show you to your apartment. It's right down the hall to mine." We climbed a few flights of stairs, and soon we where in front of the door to our new home.

"Here you are! Hope you guys like your new home! See you both tomorrow!" He said with a smile, as he walked towards his own apartment.

"Bye Ryou!"

Brian and I went inside, and we could barely believe our eyes: the house was perfect!! It had two bedrooms, a kitchen, a bathroom, and a living room. Everything we could ever need was there, but since we weren't planning on spending too much time at home, we didn't pay much attention to that.

"This house is perfect!!" I said, leaning back on the sofa in the living room.

"I guess…"

"What's wrong?"

"I don't know… Don't you think it's kind of weird?" asked Brian, unable to keep his uneasiness to himself any longer.

I sat back up, and looked at my friend. "What?"

"This! First, we see a cosplayer that looks exactly like Bakura, then we get transported to Domino somehow…"

I shrugged. "Look, I'm not gonna pretend that I understand what's going on, because I don't. But I say that, since it has always been our dream to meet our favorite characters in person, and be able to see all our favorite Duel Monsters came alive, I believe that we should take a hold of this opportunity and enjoy it while it lasts. Besides…" I added with a smile. "We know the whole storyline. If anything bad happens, we will know how to solve it!"

He shrugged, and decided to turn in. I yawned, and decided to do the same.

But, unbeknownst to us, a dark figure with wild white hair was listening closely. "Yes, and I expect to put that knowledge that you two have to a very good use…"

**And it's done!!**** I made it a bit longer than I initially thought, but that's mainly because of the duel with Kaiba. I think it really worked out ok…**

**By the way, if anyone is wondering, yes, Kaibaman is a real card, and it does have that effect. Since Nina's deck is based around the Blue Eyes White Dragon, I thought it would be a good addition to it!**

**Please tell me what you think; I'm always looking for new ways to improve! There is cake for all who review****, and to whoever can guess who was that person who was listening at the door!!!**


	4. Chapter 4

**Hi everyone!!!!! It's been kinda hard to get around to writing this chapter, with tests and exams quickly approaching, but here it is! This one was also kinda hard to write, because I had several ideas for how it should go, but I think this way was the best. And, because it took me so long to upload this chapter, I decided to make this one extra long!**

**By the way, there are a lot of episodes that I will have to skip, because they are the episodes where Joey and Yugi win their locator cards, and it would take forever to write all of them… But anyways, enjoy!**

**And, also, a**** big thanks to everyone who enjoys and has been supporting this fic. You guys rock! **

**Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh or Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series. I do, however, own my OC's in this story, Nina and Brian.**

**Chapter 4**

The next day, I woke up to find that I was in the same room as last night.

"_So that really wasn't a dream… That really did happen! We really are in Domino city!" _I thought, excited about the new things Brian and I could do today.

Roughly around that time, my friend began to wake up slowly in the room next to mine. He got of his room and mumbled a good morning, before heading to the kitchen for his breakfast. I laughed at this; ever since I had known him, he had never been much of a morning person.

I went to the kitchen to fix my own meal, and afterward we both got ready to take a walk around town.

When we were ready to leave, we heard someone ring the doorbell. I went to answer it, and saw Ryou with a worried expression on his face.

"Ryou, what happened?"

"Yugi just called me. He said that he needs our help!"

"Why?"

"Yugi got a call from Joey's mother this morning, saying that Joey never made it to the hospital. His sister says that she won't get the operation unless he's there, but we can't find him! He just called Tristan and Tea too, to get more people out there looking for him."

"Ok, hang on a minute, and we'll go with you." We both got ready, and followed Ryou to go and meet the gang.

A couple of moments later, Tristan arrived in a motorcycle, and took off his helmet. "I just finished searching through the places Joey usually hangs out at. There's no sign of him!"

"Now what?"

"We have to split up and search the rest of the city. Ryou and I will search around this area." said Yugi.

"Then I'll search around the city." said Tristan.

"And I'll go to the warehouse district." said Tea.

"I guess me and Nina will search the park."

We all split up and started our search. Half way towards the park, I turned to Brian and asked him why he didn't just say where Joey was.

"How where we gonna explain it? We only know him for around a day and a half, and suddenly we know where he went running off to?"

"Yeah, I guess it would be hard to explain that…"

"Besides, we never know, it is possible he's just walking around the city now, and he decided to stop at the beach when Tristan found him."

So we arrived at the park, and searched around for a few minutes, but there no sign of Joey anywhere.

"I guess we better go and see the beach, there's no point in just sitting here…" said Brian. So we walked towards the beach, to find that Tristan was already there, trying to talk some sense back into Joey.

"Wow… I never thought I'd see this scene outside of the Japanese version…"

We approached them, just as Tristan was yelling at Joey, grabbing Joey's by his shirt.

"What are you doing here? You should be at the hospital!"

When Joey fell back down, he started to sob. Tristan, surprised to see his friend act so uncharacteristically, asked him what was wrong.

"Yesterday on the way to the hospital, I was stopped by three guys wearing purple cloaks, who called themselves "Rare Hunters". They go around, challenging other duelists to unfair duels, and stealing their rare cards. I lost the game, and he took my Red Eyes."

Tristan then knelt down next to his friend. "You can worry about that later, Serenity needs you!"

Joey turns away from him. "You don't get it! To me, the Red Eyes is the key to victory!" Tristan replies that, if Joey doesn't get to the hospital soon, his sister won't have the operation. "She wants you to be there to encourage her!"

However, Joey still seemed depressed, saying that he wouldn't be able to comfort her. Tristan then decided that talking isn't going to get him anywhere, so he decides to punch Joey, knocking him back. As we were watching the whole scene, Brian and I winced.

"That had to hurt…"

"I can't believe you're giving up on your sister because of a card game! I can see that you and Yugi love playing it, but right now, there are more important things on the line!"

Joey looked at Tristan, finally seeing the truth in his friend's words, and nodded. "You're right, let's go to the hospital!"

They both get on Tristan's motorcycle, and ride off on the direction of the hospital.

"Well, now what?"

"I guess we have to go meet Yugi and the others, and tell them that Tristan found Joey, and has taken him to see Serenity."

Brian nodded and we took off towards the meeting place, where Yugi, Tea and Ryou were waiting.

"Did you find him?"

"No, Tristan did. He made Joey come back to his senses, and they're on their way to go see Serenity."

They all sighed in relief. "At least we know that he's safe." said Tea.

"Yeah, but what will he do when he gets there?"

"I'm sure they will be fine." said Yugi. We all nodded, and decided to return home, after a full day of searching.

Several days passed after that little incident, and a lot happened since then; Yugi and Joey were just two locator cards away from the finals, and we didn't know much about Bakura. Lately, he's been going around town on his own, but I knew that he would make it to the finals, so I wasn't really worried.

Brian and I also had five locator cards each, and today, we where on our way to the park to try and gain our last card.

"Who do you think we should challenge?" he asked.

"I dunno. We'll probably have to duel someone like the other people we dueled."

We arrived at the park and started to look for anyone who had a Duel Disk on. And, fortunately, we found the perfect duo to duel.

"Well, look who it is…"

"Who?"

I pointed at two kids: one had a closed green jacket with a beetle pattern on the front and black shorts, while the other had a green jacket, a red beanie cap, and brown trousers.

"Weevil Underwood and Rex Raptor…" Brain said, smirking. "Sure, I've always wanted to beat them in a real duel!" then, he turned to them and shouted. "Hey, you two, with the Duel Disks!"

"What do you want?" asked Weevil.

"You two are duelists, right? How about a duel for your Locator cards?"

"Forget it! We don't want to duel two nobodies like you!"

"Hey, wait, I know you two…" I said.

"Oh, so you recognized me as the Japanese Duel Monsters champion, Weevil Underwood?"

"And I was the runner up. My name's Rex Raptor!"

"No, I was just talking to one of my friends, called Joey, the other day, and he said that Rex was beat by a kid that pretended to have psychic powers, and that he beat Weevil and took his Locator Card." I said thoughtfully. Weevil and Rex sweatdropped.

"W-well, that's not true, because, as you can see, we're still in this tournament!"

"Yeah, and we can beat anybody that crosses our path!"

"Well, if you think you're so tough, how about this: we'll do a Tag Duel. The first team whose Life Points reach zero loses, and the winning team gets all the Locator Cards and the losing Team's rarest cards."

They started to talk amongst themselves, but soon came to an agreement.

"Let's do it!"

"I'll start!" said Weevil. "Behold the awesome power of my Insect army! I set one card face down, Set one monster, and end my turn."

"Some power... You can't even summon a powerful monster to attack? You have to hide behind them?" asked Brian, taunting him.

However, Weevil just snickered. "You will see the power of my deck soon enough! Hehehehe!!!"

"My turn! I summon Giant Rat! Attack his face down card!" said Brian.

"Not so fast! I activate my trap card, Negate Attack!"

Brian's monster suddenly hit a barrier, and was sent back, as Weevil's monster staid intact on the field.

"_That monster must have a powerful effect, if he wants to protect it that bad..."_ I thought, as I watched Weevil laugh as Brian could do nothing more that set a card face down on the field, and end his turn. Then it suddenly occurred to me what he was planning. _"Oh no..."_

"Brian! That monster is the Parasite Paracide!"

"What?" He looked at me shocked, as Weevil continued to laugh.

"So you finally figured out our strategy, huh? But it's too late, because all your monsters will soon become infected!!!"

"Yeah, and we will be on our way to the Battle City Finals!!" Rex said, as he flip summoned Weevil's monster, and sure enough, it was the Parasite Paracide. The monster suddenly attacked Brian's deck, and hid somewhere in his cards.

"Now, I'll Special Summon my Gilasaurus, and Tribute it to Summon my Sword Arm of Dragon! Now, destroy Giant Rat!"

The huge dinosaur slashed through Giant Rat with his tail, destroying it and dropping our Life Points to 3650.

"Then I activate my monster's effect, and Summon a monster that has 1500 ATK points or less to the field." Brian said, summoning Giant Soldier of Stone. However, when he was shuffling his deck, his face went pale.

"What's wrong?"

"The next card I'm about to draw... It's Weevil's card!"

"Then that means that on your next turn..."

"All your monster will become infected, and will be turned into bugs!!!" said Weevil, and started to laugh again.

"Then I guess we better finish this duel quickly. I summon Dunames Dark Witch. Attack Rex's dinosaur!"

"No! My monster!" Rex cried, as his Life Points dropped.

"Now, Giant Soldier of Stone, attack their Life Points directly!" The stone beast swung his sword at our two opponents, lowering their Life Points to a total of 2650.

"You still haven't won! My turn. I summon Leghul, and now I activate my monster's effect, and attack your Life Points directly!!"

Weevil's monster crawled his way towards me and attacked me directly, causing me to flinch.

"_How can this thing hurt me? It's just a hologram!!" _I thought as my Life Points hit 3350.

"And finally, I activate Insect Barrier. Now all your monsters won't be able to attack our Life Points, as long as this card remains on the field."

"I guess it's my turn now..." said Brian. I knew that he really didn't want to draw that monster, but he had no choice, as the monster emerged on the field and began to infect both our monsters. "I set one monster face down, and end my turn."

"Now it's time you felt the rage of my dinosaurs! I Summon Mad Sword Beast, in attack mode! Now, send that face down monster back to the Stone Age! And because of its effect, you take damage equal to the difference of my dinosaur's ATK points and your monster's DEF points! And Leghul, attack them directly!" The face down card was flipped, revealing Baron of the Fiend Sword, who immediately got destroyed, dropping our Life Points to 2450.

"_The situation looks bad. We can't attack with any of our monsters, and we can't Tribute Summon any High leveled monsters, because the ones on the field are infected by the Parasite!" _I thought. _"The only thing to do now is to wait for the right card to appear." _I put the Giant Soldier of Stone in defense mode, and ended my turn.

On the next turn, Weevil just attacked us with Leghul, and summoned Pinch Hopper.

Brian looked hopefully at his deck, trying to think of a strategy to get our monsters free. As he drew, he got a smile on his face, and set his newly acquired monster in the field face down.

"Now who's hiding behind their monsters?" asked Rex, taunting Brian. "Mad Sword Beast, attack that face down card!"

"Oh, I wouldn't do that if I were you.."

"Why not?"

As in response to Rex's question, a monster came out of the flipped card. And that monster was...

"A Man-Eater Bug?!" asked Weevil, looking scared as the bug started to search for a target.

"That's right. I've had one in my deck all along, and as someone who uses a deck built around Insects, you should know that when this card is flipped, it can destroy any monster on the field. And I choose to destroy the Parasite Paracide!"

The Man-Eater Bug leaped and attacked the Parasite, and got destroyed in the process. Our Life Points were now at 1650.

"Now that our monsters are finally free, the real duel can start! I Tribute my Dunames Dark Witch, to Summon Airknight Parshath. Attack his Mad Sword Beast!" My monster complied, swinging his sword, and destroying the monster.

On the next turn, all that Weevil could do was to set Soldier Ant, and end his turn.

"It's time to finish this! I Tribute my Giant Soldier of Stone to Summon Machine King! And now I activate my trap card, DNA Surgery! This allows me to pick one type of monster, and as long as this card stays on the field, all monsters that are summoned become that type. And I pick Machine!"

Suddenly, all our monsters began to turn into machines.

"No!!! My bug army!!!"

"Their not the ones you should be worried about!" Brian said, as his Machine King's ATK power began to rise. "My Machine King gains 100 ATK points for every Machine Type on the field, and right now there are five of them, bringing my monster's power to 2700. Now, attack Leghul!"

Weevil looked on, as his monster was sent to the Graveyard, and as Airknight Parshath attacked his face down monster, making them lose the Duel.

"Dammit! Our scheme was foolproof!"

"What are you talking about?"

"Legally, we're not in the tournament anymore, but we still had a good deck and a Duel Disk, so we scammed some kids out of their Locator Cards, and took their rare cards..."

"_So that's how they're still in the tournament..."_

"But Kaiba is sure to notice that and disqualify us now." said Rex, looking down. But he looked back up, with a smirk on his face. "But if we have to leave this tournament, at least it wasn't because of a fluke win by some punk kids." He said, handing me a Locator Card, and his rarest card: Tri-Horned Dragon. "Maybe we will get to duel someday again."

Weevil, however, was not taking defeat as smoothly as Rex.

"No!!!! I refuse to lose like this!!!"

"Those are the rules, Weevil."

He glared at us, but handed over a Locator Card and Javelin Beetle to Brian. "This isn't over! I will have my rematch!"

As they walked away, I turned to my friend and we started to celebrate. "We're in the finals!"

"Not a moment too soon, the finals are supposed to take place tonight!"

We continued to celebrate, but it wouldn't last long. I looked behind him, watching a familiar figure.

"What's wrong?"

"Don't look now, but there's a Steve behind us."

"In that case, I think there's only one thing to do..." We both nodded at each other, and broke into a run in the opposite direction.

We ran down the street, trying to get somewhere safe, but our efforts proved to be useless as more Rare Hunters cornered us and knocked us out. Before we fell into the blackness, I heard one of them say: "Master Marik will be very pleased that we finally managed to capture these two..."

A few hours later, we woke up in what looked like a warehouse, full of crates and boxes.

"Ow... my aching head..."

"We have got to stop passing out so often, afterward we just feel like we had a bad hangover..."

"I just hope it wasn't another dimension jump, I don't think I could take being sent to somewhere like 5D's..." I said, gripping my head. Don't get me wrong, I like Yu-Gi-Oh 5D's, but the last thing I needed was to get run over by a motorcycle.

"I would finish that joke, but I really don't feel like it right now..." Brian said, as he slowly got up, using one of the crates as support.

As soon as we were able to get back on our feet, three cloaked people came in.

"Master Marik demands to see both his new prisoners. Move!" the one on the front said.

The ones behind him quickly grabbed us and lead us out of the room we were in, and down a corridor that lead to a bigger room, that had torches on either side of the walls, and a throne like chair in the opposite side of the room from we were standing, in which sat a cloaked figure that I knew was Marik.

"Master Marik, we have brought the ones you seek."

"Very good. You may return to your guarding posts." The three henchmen did as they were told, and left the room. As soon as they were gone, Marik turned to us.

"So these are the two duelists who came from another dimension..."

We were shocked that he knew about our true origins, but still tried to pretend like we didn't know what he was talking about.

"What are you..."

"Don't play dumb with me! Your little friend has already told me everything!"

"Who?"

Marik smirked. "The last person person you two saw before you arrived in this dimension."

We thought about what he meant for a second, and then it came to us.

"Bakura?!"

"Yes. He found out about a dimension where this one existed only as a product as someone's imagination. But what he found more intriguing is that they also knew about events that haven't happened yet. So he formulated a plan to bring someone from that world to this one, and make them give him all the information he needed."

"And how do you know all this?" asked Brian.

"Because Bakura and I are now allies. He is going to help me reclaim the power of the Pharaoh, and rule the world!" Marik said, laughing.

I looked at him, and started laughing as an idea crossed my mind. " You know, I believe that is called Thiefshipping..."

Brian started laughing at that statement, and Marik just looked at me confused. "You believe what is called what now?"

Brian, still trying to hold back tears, shook his head. "You really don't want to know..."

Marik just shrugged and ignored that, as he turned away from us. I asked him why we were there.

"You have been brought here to make sure that you fulfill your part in our plan." Marik simply answered.

"And what makes you so sure that we are going to do that?" asked Brian.

Marik turned back to face us, with a smirk on his face. "Because I have a, how should I put this, a small "insurance"."

""Insurance"..."

Marik then snapped his fingers, and two more of his Rare Hunters came in with another prisoner. One with white hair, that had bandages on his left arm.

"Ryou!"

"It would be a shame if he got hurt even more, now wouldn't it?"

I ran over to Ryou, who was on the floor unconscious, and with a knife wound on his arm, no doubt caused by the dagger hidden inside the Millennium Rod. I clenched my fists and glared at Marik.

"So, will you cooperate?"

"Never, you-" started Brian, but I interrupted him.

"What do you need to know?"

"What?"

The young Ishtar smirked. "All in due time. You will get more information on what we want from you two exactly soon enough. In the mean time, I believe you have a tournament to get to."

I nodded, and he told us to leave, saying not to tell any of this meeting to the Pharaoh, or any of his friends, or a fate worst then Ryou's would await us.

Once we were outside, Brian started to yell at me. "Why did you agree to do that?"

"I didn't have a choice!"

"Like hell you didn't. You just didn't want to chose any other option!"

"Can you give me a little bit more faith? I have a plan."

"Oh yeah? Like what?"

"When the time comes, you and everyone else will find out."

Brian sighed. "Well, I just hope it's a good plan.."

I put a hand on his shoulder. "Don't worry, it'll be alright. Now, let's get to that blimp!"

He slapped his forehead. "That's right!" He took out his Duel Disk, and put all the Locator Cards on it, showing a hologram of the map of the city, with a mark indicating where the tournament was being held. We followed the map to the Kaiba Corp Stadium, where Kaiba and Mokuba were awaiting the finalists.

"Hey Nina, check it out; it's Hans and Grubber. They will be needing to see our Locator Cards before they will be letting us pass!"

We both started to laugh, which made Kaiba look in our direction.

"So, you two finally made it to the finals?" asked Kaiba.

"I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to give you another chance at that Blue Eyes, now could I?"

Kaiba glared at me when he remembered the defeated a few days before, at the hands of his most trusted card.

Just then, Yugi and the gang showed up, and Kaiba didn't look too pleased that Joey made it to the finals.

"Hey, you guys made it!" said Joey, greeting us.

"We wouldn't miss it for the world!"

"Now all that's left is to see who the other finalists are."

Then, another person join the group of finalists.

"Hey look, it's Namu!" said Joey. "He was the one who helped Ryou." He and Tea then explained the whole situation to Yugi, and introduced him to Namu.

"Namu" joined the group and smiled warmly, saying that it was just a fluke that he was there.

Afterward, Ryou joined us the stadium. Everyone else was too shocked that he had maintained his decision to compete, even though he had been injured and should be recovering at the hospital. However, he diverted their attention from him, by saying that another duelist was approaching. He was a tall guy, wearing a purple cloak.

"_That's Odion. So now the only person missing is Ishizu..."_

"Hey, that's that guy Marik! He was the one who captured us!" said Joey, trying to go punch Odion.

"Captured?" Brian asked, trying to act like he didn't know what was going on.

Yugi shook his head. "It's a long story, we'll tell you later."

"Attention, duelists!" said one of Kaiba's men. "This stadium is not where the finals will be taking place. The real site shall arrive shortly." At that moment, a huge aircraft whit the words "Kaiba Craft 3" landed a few feet away from us, in the center of the half built Stadium.

Mokuba then told everyone to get on board, and Odion, Marik, Mai, Yugi, Ryou, Joey, Brian and me all got into the ship after showing our tournament ID's. However, because they didn't have any, when Tea, Tristan, Serenity and Duke tried to go in as well, they were stopped by Kaiba's men.

They all try to plead with them to let them pass, but to no avail. Finally, Mokuba tells them to let the rest of the gang in.

"These are Mr. Kaiba's rules, we can't do anything!"

"Please, Seto, let then aboard." says Mokuba. Kaiba just shrugs.

"Whatever."

Taking that as a permission to go aboard, the gang rush inside, and as he is walking up the steps of the blimp, Kaiba tells the guards to begin take-off immediately.

"Mr. Kaiba, there's one duelist missing." One of his security guards said.

"I don't care. The most important thing in this tournament - the three God cards – are already on board." He then turned around, and went up the stairs.

I decided to hurry up, and go to the observation lounge, where everyone was watching the city below.

"Hey, Nina, Brian, you guys still haven't met our friends, yet, right?" said Joey, calling us over. "This is Duke, that's Mai, and my sister Serenity."

"Hi!"

They all greeted us, and wished us good luck in the tournament.

"By the way, Joey, thanks for bringing me here." said Serenity, turning to Joey.

Her brother just laughed. "It's just one of the many good things about having a champ in the family!"

Kaiba snickered at that comment. "Please Wheeler. Everyone knows that the only reason your even on this blimp is because of a fluke. Don't get your hopes too high – it will be long way down, and last time I checked, monkeys can't fly."

Joey looked pretty steamed at that comment, but Kaiba turned to Yugi, telling him that he should put Slifer in his deck, because he intend to win it. By the time the tournament was over, he would be the greatest duelist in the world, with all three Egyptian God cards.

Then, we all retired to our rooms, which were locked and could only be opened by using our ID's.

Me and Brian went to our room, and tried to go over some card strategies, but ended up just laughing at all the noise that was coming from Joey's room, where everyone sort of decided to throw a party.

After a while, we heard a voice sound through the blimp. "Attention duelists!The finals are about to begin. Please everyone report to the main hall."

I got up and turned to Brian. "I swear, if he says "Attention duelists" one more time, I'm just going to ask if his hair has something to tell us."

"I guess it must be a guard thing."

We got out of the room and headed to the main hall. Everyone else was already there, and one Kaiba's men, who was next to a lottery machine shaped like a Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon, was explaining the rules.

"Every duelist was given one number upon entering the blimp. First, there will be a lottery to determine who will duel first. The second pair of duelists won't be selected until the first duel has ended, so the duelists won't know who they are dueling until just before the duel starts. Does everyone know their numbers?"

I looked down at my tournament card, and saw that my number was 10. Brian's card said his was 9.

The lottery machine in front of us was turned on, and the numbers inside started to spin. After a while, one of the Dragon's heads swallowed up a ball and rolled out into a trough, revealing the number 6.

Ryou laughed nervously, saying that he wasn't expecting to be chosen so early. The others kept asking him if he was alright, and kept telling him that he should return to his room and rest.

But then the second number was selected, and it was...

"Number ten!"

Brian and I looked at each other shocked, and my breath got caught in my throat.

"What?"

**Well, there you have it. It was a bit longer than I expected, but it's to make up for my absence. What will Nina do now, now that she has to duel her favorite character in what could very well be a Shadow Duel? Find out on the next chapter of "I hope this isn't a dream!". **


	5. Chapter 5

**Hello, everyone, and welcome to another installment of "I hope it's not a dream!". I'm sorry it took so long, but there are parts in this chappie that were really hard to get the way I wanted, because of the differences between the original version, and the one I wanted to create.**

**Anyway, please enjoy this chapter, and, as always, a big thank you to all the people who faved and reviewed this story!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh or Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series. I do, however, own my OC's in this story, Nina and Brian.**

* * *

**Chapter 5**

A million and one thoughts went through my mind when the announcement was done, and most of them weren't really all that good. I knew from the start that I would be facing some though opponents, but it never occurred to me that I could be facing Bakura. I mean, the original storyline said he would be facing the Pharaoh! However, I didn't have much time to think about it, because the security guard continued his announcement.

"Duelists number 6 and 10! Please proceed to the Stratos Dueling Arena."

I gulped, but followed him and Ryou nonetheless towards the elevator. Everyone else went to a different elevator. Once we arrive at our destination, it was revealed that the site for the duel would be outside, on top of the blimp. The rest of the duelists arrived, most of them shivering from the harsh temperatures.

"The Kaiba Craft 3 is now traveling at an altitude of four thousand feet. The strong winds and cold air will test your strength and stamina while dueling. If you can't take it, you don't belong here!" said Kaiba.

"_Where any of us could fall to our untimely deaths... How is any of this reasonable exactly? And second, what exactly does any of that have to with dueling?"_ I asked myself.

"Duelists, please step onto the dueling platform!"

Ryou and I rose to the platform, but then I noticed something shining to my left. Turning around, I noticed that Yami had emerged from the Millennium Puzzle.

"Kaiba, you cannot allow this duel to take place!"

Everyone stared at him, and Kaiba narrowed his eyes at his rival.

"And why is that?" he asked.

"That is not Ryou Bakura!"

At first the others did not understand, but soon a light emerged from my opponent, making the Millennium Ring appear around his neck. His hair spiked up to form two bat wing-shaped bangs, and he let out a low chuckle.

"Who are you?" asked Yami.

"I am the Spirit of the Millennium Ring, Bakura!"

Yami's friends gasped.

"But how is that possible? I threw away the Millennium Ring into a forest back in Duelist Kingdom! How could you have possibly gained it back?"

"Namu" stepped up. "I don't get it. What's the big deal about this "Millennium Ring" anyway?" Joey tried to explain it to him, including the fact that some of the items contained spirits in them, both good and bad.

"What do you expect to gain from all of this, Bakura?" asked Yami.

Bakura chuckled again. "You, along with everyone else, will find out by the end of this duel. One small piece of advice, however... you should pay more attention about who you consider to be your friends... sometimes, people are just not like they would first appear!"

They all wondered what exactly he meant, but Kaiba cut their thoughts short.

"I didn't came here to be lectured again on this magic junk, but if none of you are going to duel, then I'm going back inside to pick some real duelists to start the finals!"

"Alright, fine! It's a duel you want, it's a duel you get!" I said, activating my Duel Disk.

Bakura smirked. "Well, you have courage, I'll give you that... but for how long will you fare against my army of monsters from the Shadows?" He said, activating his.

"Duel!"

"I'll start! I summon my Silent Magician LV4, set one card face down, and end my turn."

Bakura snickered. "You really think that 1000 ATK points can stop the attacks of my monsters?"

"You'd be surprised."

He drew a card, but his face suddenly showed surprise, as my monster's ATK and DEF points suddenly grew to 1500.

"How did she do that?" asked Joey, noticing that I never touched my Duel Disk to activate any of my face down cards.

"I didn't do anything. Bakura did that by himself." I explained. "This is one of my favorite monsters. It starts off with just 1000 ATK and DEF points, but it gains 500 ATK and DEF points each time my opponent draws."

"But then that means that that monster can just continue to get stronger every turn, until the duel is over!"

"Not really. It has a limit. Once it reaches 3500 points, it evolves to Silent Magician LV8, and that becomes his base ATK."

"Evolves?"

"Yes. That monster is part of a special kind of monsters called the "LV monsters". When certain conditions are met, these monsters can evolve and become stronger, without the need to summon their stronger forms." explained Brian.

"If you're done with the boring explanations, I'd like to make my move now." Bakura said. "I summon Headless Knight, set one card face down, and end my turn."

"In that case, I'll set one monster face down, and end my turn."

Bakura smirked. "I'm disappointed. I actually thought you'd put up more of an offense, but I guess I was wrong. Headless Knight, attack that face down card!"

His monster then swung his sword towards my face down card, revealing a Morphing Jar.

"Though break, now we have to discard our hands... Guess you should have thought a little better before attacking my face down monster."

"On the contrary! You just made my life a lot easier, and yours is about to get a lot tougher."

"_I know that there were probably more fiends in his hand, but it was a necessary risk." _I thought.

"Okay, my turn! I summon Decoy Dragon, and end my turn!"

Bakura just laughed as he drew his next card, causing my Silent Magician to get an additional boost to his power. "Now I know you lost it. That's you're brilliant plan? To hide behind such a pathetic monster?"

"If you're so sure you can destroy my dragon, why don't you try?"

"If that is what you want, then prepare to be defeated. I summon Gernia. Attack!"

Bakura's monster complied, swinging his claws towards Decoy Dragon. But suddenly, my monster let out a cry, and a bright light appeared from my Graveyard, and went to my side of the field. The light then intensified, and a roar was heard. Then, standing next to my Decoy Dragon was my favorite monster, Blue Eyes White Dragon.

"No way!"

Blue Eyes let out another threatening roar, and Gernia turned towards it, deciding that this opponent was better. My dragon then shot a ray of light at it, destroying it and bringing Bakura's life points to 2300.

"How did that just happened?"

"You didn't think that I would have a monster like Morphing Jar in my deck for nothing, did you? I just needed a way to get my Blue Eyes into my Graveyard, so that Decoy Dragon's effect could be activated. If someone were to attack it, it would let me Special Summon a level 7 or higher Dragon from my Graveyard and it would become the attack target."

Bakura just frowned in response. "In that case, it's time to start the real duel! Thanks to the effects of of your Morphing Jar, there are enough monster in my Graveyard to summon my most destructive Monster!"

Already knowing what that monster was, Brian and I exchanged a glance. I turned to face my opponent again, knowing that the difficulty level of this duel had just increased.

"I now remove three of the fiends that were sent to my Graveyard, to Summon Dark Necrofear!" he took three cards from his Duel Disk, and slammed another into one of the plates. A dark purple light swooped past everyone present, before materializing on the field. "Now, just to make things interesting, I activate one of my face down cards, The Dark Door, which only allows us to attack with one monster during each Battle Phase, and end my turn."

"I guess now would be a good time to get Decoy Dragon out of the field. I sacrifice him to summon Firewing Pegasus! Now, Silent Magician, attack Dark Necrofear!" My monster aimed his scepter and shot a light blue ball of energy, that connected with its target , making it melt. As Bakura's life points fell to 2000, Yugi's friends cheered, but the destruction of his monster didn't even seem to phase Bakura, whose eyes glowed evilly.

"You really should have done your homework better..."

"What makes you think I didn't?"

"Perhaps this!" He said, opening a separate compartment on his Duel Disk, and activated a Field Spell Card. "I activate Dark Sanctuary!"

Suddenly, the arena was engulfed in misty shadows, filled with eyes and fang-filled mouths.

"In that case, I attack with Firewing Pegasus!"

Firewing Pegasus went to attack, but then a ghost appeared from it, and attacked me instead, dropping my Life Points to 2875.

Bakura just laughed. "Now do you understand the power of my deck? Every turn, one of your monsters will be infected with the Ghost of Dark Sanctuary. If you chose the infected monster to attack, you receive half of its ATK as damage, and I gain the same amount!" He said, as his Life Points rose to 3125.

"And because you have Dark Door on your side of the field, I only get one chance to attack..."

"Now you're getting it... so, what will you do now?"

"I guess I can do nothing more than end my turn..."

"Now, to ensure that victory shall be mine, I activate my face down card. Destiny Board!" Bakura said, revealing a card that made the Destiny Board appear above his head.

"Wait a minute... I've seen one of those things before, in a game in a haunted house." says Duke.

Joey just appeared freaked out at the thought that it could be something else related to ghosts, while his sister asked if it wasn't just a game.

"Let's hope so..." says Tea, and they focus again on the duel.

"What does that card do?" asked Yami.

"The Destiny Board allows me to communicate with the lost souls of the Shadow Realm, and to spell out a five letter message." says Bakura, pointing to the Destiny Board above his head, in which a hand was moving through several letters, until it stopped in the letter "F" , and the same letter appeared above the Board, surrounded by mist, and was being held by a spirit. "Every turn, the Board will spell out a new letter, and once the message is complete, the duel will be over, and I will be the winner."

"Now, to finish my turn, I summon Souls of the Forgotten. But, since I need to sacrifice one monster per turn to keep Dark Sanctuary in play, it won't be staying in the field for a lot longer." said Bakura and, as fast as his monster appeared on the field, it also disappeared.

"Well, I guess now would be a good time as any other to activate the effect of my Silent Magician."

A bright stream of light shot from beneath Silent Magician, and when it died down, my monster had grown to a bigger and stronger version of himself.

"Seeing as I can't do anything else right now, I'll end my turn." I said, making the hand in the Destiny Board move, and make another letter appear, this time an "I".

"Well, it seems that you now have run out of options, and can only wait as my card spells out your fate!" my opponent taunted, as he set another monster on the field, this time Sangan and setting a card face down.

"_I can't keep on doing nothing... Soon the whole message will be spelled out, and I'll lose! I have to try and attack him!"_

"I attack with Silent Magician LV8!"

"Nice try, but it's not going to work. I activate my face down card, Dark Spirit of the Silent! This card allows me to chose a new monster from your side of the field, and it will attack instead. Now, let's see... Which monster should I choose? Oh, how about... Blue Eyes White Dragon!" He said, pointing at the said monster, as a spirit materialized from his trap card, and flew at the dragon, who let out a roar, and flew at my opponent, only to stop in mid attack as the spirit of Dark Sanctuary appeared from it, attacking me instead, and dropping my Life Points to 1375, and Bakura's rose to 4625.

"Then I guess I'll set another card face down, and end my turn..." I said, as the third spirit letter appeared.

"How helpless must you feel now, knowing that your defeat is imminent?" Bakura asked, sacrificing Headless Knight to keep Dark Sanctuary in play.

As I drew my next card, a smile formed itself on my face. "Not all that helpless. At least, not anymore."

"What?"

"See, there's one thing you still haven't explained about the Destiny Board. Although its true that it's a really good card, almost as good as Exodia, in fact, there are two small flaws that can incapacitate it. One is the space needed to play it. You need to have the entire Spell and Trap card area free, so that the message can be spelled correctly. However, you managed to avoid this problem, by using Dark Sanctuary. The other is that the trap card itself forms a kind of chain... Should one part of it disappear, then the whole message is destroyed..." I smirked, then revealed the card I drew. "I play Mystical Space Typhoon And I choose to target the Destiny Board!"

A typhoon appeared from my card, and rose until it struck the Destiny Board, destroying it and all the Spirit Messages. The gang started to cheer, thinking that, since the possibility of the immediate defeat was now far away. However, Bakura only scowled at the loss of his card.

"I told you I did my homework... And now, I activate my face down card, Dust Tornado, which allows me to destroy another one of your spell or trap cards. And I choose The Dark Door! And I attack with Silent Magician LV8!" I said, praying that my attack was not stopped. Fortunately, this time my attack connected with its target, and Bakura's Life Points got lowered to 1125.

"And to finish off, I attack with..." but suddenly, I notice someone on my left. Someone tall, who was wearing a purple cloak.

"_Oh, you have got to be kidding me..."_

"You'd better wait before you preform that attack."

Joey started to try and go after Odion, while Duke and Tristan did their best to try and restrain him.

"Who do you think you are, coming here, and interrupt the duel like this?" asked Mokuba.

"The one you call Ryou Bakura is under the control of my Millennium Rod, and I plan to release him from the spirit's control." Odion says, pointing the Millennium item at Bakura. Suddenly, he fell to his knees, clutching his injured arm.

"Wha-what's going on?"

"You'd best reconsider your attack. Without the spirit of the Ring to sustain the attack for him, his host could suffer greatly from the attack."

"Only a coward would resort to such a trick to win a duel!" said Yami, angry at the other's actions. Joey agreed, saying that it was a really cheap trick.

Odion ignored their comments, however, and retreated back inside.

Ryou continued to wonder how he got on the dueling platform, and how he got wounded on his arm. I took a step forward, but Roland stopped me.

"No duelist is allowed to touch his opponent during a duel. If they do, they are immediately disqualified."

Everyone started to protest, saying that Ryou needed urgent medical attention.

"_Now what? I don't want to forfeit, but I don't want to fire an attack and risk hurting him, either..."_

Just then, Kaiba's voice brought me back from my thoughts.

"What are you waiting for? Attack and finish this duel!"

Roland insisted once more that I had to make a decision, or I would be disqualified. Then, Joey started to climb atop the dueling platform, and yelled that Roland should stop the duel, before being restrained by Duke and Tristan, after being told that he too could be disqualified.

As I was about to place my hand over my Duel Disk, and declare a forfeit, I heard Ryou speak.

"Wait!"

I looked up, and saw that he was doing his best to try and get up.

"I may not know just what is going on, but I know that it probably has something to do with the spirit of the Ring. Am I right?"

I nodded. He looked at his Duel Disk, and saw the number of Life Points that he had left.

"In that case, I think it would be best to just attack me and end the duel."

I was about to protest, but he beat me to it. "If you don't, if you forfeit the duel, that means that my Yami will have won, and will be one step closer to accomplishing whatever it is that he wants."

The others looked uneasy, and kept telling him that he could get seriously hurt, but Ryou had his mind made up. When I was about to make my decision, there was another flash of light, and when it died down, Bakura stood once again where Ryou had been just a few seconds ago.

"I admit I lost this time. Go ahead, and attack. Don't worry, I won't let your friend die. Attack me! This body is very important to me, and I won't let it die." Bakura said, opening his arms to welcome the final attack.

Believing that he was speaking the truth, I ordered my Blue Eyes White Dragon to attack. The Dragon then fired a ray of energy at Bakura, who took the attack laughing, and the blast filled the arena with light. Once it died down, Ryou reappeared again, as Roland announced me the winner.

The others rush to Ryou's aid, who was weak, but conscious. With Tristan's help, they were able to carry him to Ryou's room. I started to go with them, but Roland stopped me.

"As the winner of the duel, and according to the Battle City rules, you can now receive your opponent's rarest card."

"That's great, but my friend is barely conscious because of a stab wound on his arm, and because of the duel. So, if you don't mind, there are more important things to worry about right now that card games."

And with that, I left to go join the gang. Once I arrived at his room, I saw that they were crowded around Ryou's bed, were he was, already asleep.

"He needs rest." said Duke. "We need to land the blimp and get him to a hospital."

"Some really crazy stuff happened out there! What was that all about?" Joey asked me.

"I don't really know. All I can say, was that it was a good thing that Bakura came back to the duel, or I don't know what I would have done..."

"So, he let you win?"

"I don't know... I guess he just did what he felt had to be done to protect his host body."

"What I don't understand is, why let Ryou out in the first place?" asked Joey.

"But he didn't. It was Marik that released him." said Yugi.

"That sounds as if Marik and the evil spirit of the Ring are working together!" exclaimed Tea, to which Yugi agreed.

Joey jumped up, ready to go after Marik again, but Tristan stopped him, saying that they had to talk to Kaiba about landing the blimp, and get Ryou some medical help.

"Then, if you guys don't mind, I'll stay here, to see if Ryou will wake up." I said, looking at him. After glancing at me, Brian decided that he would stay behind as well.

Yugi agreed, but just before they left, he turned around and noticed that the Ring was gone.

"That thing seems to come and go as it pleases." said Tristan. Joey added that they could worry about it later.

Yugi nodded, and they left.

"What do you think Kaiba's reaction towards them is gonna be?" asked Brian, trying to cheer me up.

"He's probably gonna tell them that landing is out of the question, and to direct all complaints towards someone who will give a crap."

"So, he won't show them any compassion..." said Brian, sighing.

"Show any what now?"

Brian laughed. "At least your sense of humor didn't get affected."

"It's what gets me through the days..."

"What a touching story..." said a voice that came from the entrance. We turned around to see that it was Marik.

"What do you want?" I said angrily, turning around to face him.

He merely smirked, as he took a few steps closer. "Is that any way to treat your allies?"

"Making us work for you does not make us allies!" said Brian.

Marik just shook his head. "My, it sure is a good thing that little Yugi and his friends aren't here to hear you... By the way, where are they?"

"Get to the point, Marik. We know you didn't came here to see how Bakura was doing!"

"How very perceptive! And what an interesting choice of words, because I did come here to ask you about this tournament."

"What, you just came here to learn about a few duels?"asked Brian, confused.

"For now. I assure you, this is merely a test. The real deal will come later."

I smirked, feeling that I had the upper hand for once. "Then the joke's on you, because we can't help you there."

"What?"

"As you might have noticed, the first duel was me against Bakura. In our world, it was supposed to be the Pharaoh against Bakura. So, for all we know, all the duels could now have a different line-up."

"Does that mean that you are of no use to me now?" asked Marik.

"I wouldn't go as far as to say that. We can tell you something, though. The duels on this tournament should be the least of your concerns."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"There is someone on board of the blimp, who is capable of being even more dangerous and intimidating than Bakura. One with such thirst for power, that will stop at nothing to achieve it. One who has been asleep for the past ten years, and will very soon awaken again. One that is simply known as... Melvin!"

"Melvin?" said Marik, his face showing clear confusion.

"Yes, and very soon, your paths will cross, and you will have to fight him for something much more important that power – your very existence."

"And, probably after the next duel, you are gonna have one hell of a headache!" said Brian.

Marik just looked more confused, and also somewhat angry that he didn't get the information he wanted, but before he could really say anything about it, an announcement was heard throughout the blimp.

"All duelists, please report to the main hall. The duelists that will take part in the next duel are about to be selected."

We all walked out of the room, and headed to the main hall. When we got there, the Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon had already swallowed two more numbers, and Roland was taking them out.

"The next duelists are..."

**And I'm gonna leave it there. Once again, I'm sorry it took so long to write it, but there were two scenes that were kinda hard to write. The first one was the duel, and the other was the talk with Marik.**

**As for what Nina said to Marik about Melvin (Yami Marik, to those not familiar with the Abridged Series) was mostly to mess with his head, kinda like a little payback to how he made her and Brian's life harder than it needed to be. Remember, there are cookies to those who read and review!**


	6. Chapter 6

**Hello everyone, and welcome, to another installment of "I hope it's not a dream!"! I'm sorry I didn't have this fic updated in forever, but I started college this year, and most of my time had to go to that. Now that it's over, I can concentrate on this, and on "Seto Kaiba's Kickassia". Also, just a little heads up, in the next duel, you'll probably notice that one of the duelists doesn't have the same deck he does in the anime. I thought this deck suited him, and made him a bit more unpredictable. His original cards are still there, I just added some more to it. I hope that's OK, and hopefully, it'll be the only change I make to characters of Yu-Gi-Oh in terms of their deck. Now, on with the fic!**

**Disclaimer: I do not own Yu-Gi-Oh or Yu-Gi-Oh the Abridged Series. I do, however, own my OC's in this story, Nina and Brian.**

**Chapter 6 **

"The next duelists are numbers 3, and 7!"

All of Yugi's friends gathered around him, wishing him luck for the upcoming duel. Joey said that he wished he could repay 'Marik' for making him duel Yugi against his will, but if Yugi did it instead, then he would support him.

We all walked to the dueling platform, as Yugi's Puzzle began to glow again, as Yami once more took control. Once on the platform, Yami and Odion started shuffling each others Decks.

"This is gonna be a good duel." said Brian.

"Why do you say that?"

"It's not everyday you get to see a battle between two God cards, right?"

"I guess..." I said, but then I got an idea. "What about what happens afterward?"

"I'm kinda trying to avoid thinking about it..."

I laughed, but we then turned our attention towards the duel that was about to start, as both duelists finished, and went to opposite sides of the platform. When they turned to face each other, Odion was holding something – a very realistic replica of the Millennium Rod. At that sight, Joey cringed and Yami merely looked on, unfazed. After a few moments, Odion put the object away, and turned on his Duel Disk.

"Marik must have a ton of rare cards in his deck, since he's the Leader of the Rare Hunters, right big brother?" asked Mokuba.

"There's only one card in his deck I care about Mokuba. His God Card, the Winged Dragon of Ra! I just hope that Yugi makes this duel last enough, so I can see it in action, and I can win it to strengthen my own deck." answered Seto, keeping his eyes on the two duelists the entire time.

"Start the duel!"

"Little Yugi, you will soon find that this is no ordinary duel, for you will deal with a force that has existed for thousands of years." said Odion, as he drew his first card. "I activate the effect of a monster from my hand, Gravekeeper's Command, allowing me to had the Necrovalley spell card to my hand." The field of play then became what looked like a canyon, with cliffs behind the two duelists. "Then, I'll set Gravekeeper's Curse."

A monster materialized on Odion's side of the field, and immediately a strange green mist left the monster, and surrounded Yami, who winced in pain.

"What was that?" asked Joey, looking at Odion, probably thinking that he cheated.

"When it is summoned, Gravekeeper's Curse can inflict 500 points of damage to my opponent's Life Points. Next, I'll play the Necrovalley field spell card, which adds 500 ATK and DEF to my monsters, and I'll end my turn."

"Is it just me, or did Marik pick up a new deck for Odion since the last time we saw the anime?" asked Brian, in what was almost a whisper.

"Yeah, I was thinking the same thing... but how? This deck only exists in the Yami Marik pack..."

"So, what, you're thinking Bakura got it for him?"

"And the evidences of Thiefshipping just keep piling up... still, I guess it is a better idea than the almighty force of the Gummy Bears, or the Easter Bunny..."

We both tried to control our laughter, as we watched Yami prepare his first move.

"My turn. I'll fuse Beformet and Gazelle the King of Mythical Beasts to form Chimera, the Flying Mythical Beast!" The two monsters appeared briefly on the field, before fusing into a more powerful version. "Now, my monster, attack Gravekeeper's Curse!"

Chimera jumped at Odion's monster, and slashed its claws, destroying it.

"Next, I will summon Sangan, in defense mode, and end my turn."

Odion merely looked on, unfazed from the monster's attack.

"I summon Gravekeeper's Spy in defense mode, and set two cards face down."

"Man, that's no good..." said Joey. "With a defensive power of 2500, he can stop any attack that Yuge throws at him!"

Yami, however, looked like he had a plan. "My turn! I sacrifice my Sangan to summon my Dark Magician Girl, and I activate the equip spell card, Magic Formula, raising her attack strength to 2700!" A book appeared from the activated spell card, which Dark Magician Girl began to read. "Now, attack with Dark Burning Attack!" Having found the spell she was looking for, the apprentice magician aimed her attack and fired, destroying Gravekeeper's Spy.

"And now, Chimaera, attack his Life Points directly!" The winged monster complied, running up to Odion and slashing him, bringing his Life Points to 1900.

"I thank you, little Yugi, for destroying my monster, for now I shall be able to show the first of the many surprises that my deck holds." Odion said, drawing a card. "Because of Gravekeeper's Spy's effect, I can Special Summon a monster with "Gravekeeper's" in it's name that has 1500 ATK or less from my deck. And I choose Gravekeeper's Cannonholder, which I will tribute for Gravekeeper's Chief. Now I will activate it's effect to summon Gravekeeper's Cannonholder back from the Graveyard! Now, Gravekeeper's Chief, attack Chimaera!" The monster raised his staff, and fired at Chimaera, who got destroyed immediately.

"Then I activate my monster's effect, that allows me to Summon back to the field one of the monsters used in the fusion that created it! And I chose Gazelle, the King of Mythical Beasts!" Yami said, as Gazelle materialized on the field where Chimaera had been just a few seconds ago.

"Now I will attack your Gazelle with my Gravekeeper's Cannonholder!" Odion commanded, and his monster took aim, loading his cannon that he carried on his shoulder, and fired at Gazelle. " Now, I activate his effect, which allows me to deliver 700 points of damage to my opponents Life Points, by Tributing a "Gravekeeper's" monster." Gravekeeper's Chief mounted the cannon, and Cannonholder aimed, and launched him at Yami, who recoiled from the impact, making his Life Points drop to 2100. His friends quickly got as near as they could to him, yelling words of encoragement. Kaiba merely looked on, uninterested. With some difficulty, Yami got back on his feet, and drew his next card.

"Man, Yuge doesn't stand much of a chance against a deck like that! With that Field Spell Card in play, any monster that Marik plays has a huge advantage!" said Joey.

"Yugi will find a way to win! He's gotten himself out of tougher situations before, he can do the same here!" said Tristan, and the rest of the gang cheered in agreement. Yami looked at them for a moment, smiling to show appreciation for all their support, and focused on his hand.

"My turn! I activate Mystical Space Typhoon, and I chose to destroy Necrovalley!" A typhoon rose from the card, and hit Odion's card, causing the field spell to disappear, and all of his monsters' ATK and DEF points return to their normal values. "Now, my Dark Magician Girl, attack with Dark Burning Attack!" Once again, the young magician fired, and hit Odion's remaining monster, bringing his life Points to 600. "Now, to end my turn, I will summon one of my most loyal monsters, the Celtic Guardian, in attack mode!"

Yugi's friends cheered, saying that he had finally been able to outsmart Marik, but Odion merely smirked, and beside Brian and me, I could see Marik smirking as well, as he held the real Millennium Rod behind his back.

"Hey!" I whispered, nudging Brian and pointing discretely towards Marik. He looked, and tried not to laugh.

"LK was right... You really can completely ruin his plans from here!"

"I know! I still can't believe nobody notices! I mean, it's right there!" I whispered back, holding back my laughter as well, and focusing once again on the duel.

Odion drew a card, and stared confusingly at it, like it was a surprise even to him that it was there. The Millennium Rod behind Marik's back glowed softly, and after a few moments, and Odion seemed to be back to smirking at his imminent victory.

"I applaud your efforts, little Yugi. But, you see, that part of my deck is not where it's true strength resides. It was only a trial test, and now you shall see the power that lies within it! I activate The Temple of the Kings!" said Odion, as a huge temple began to rise behind him, that had a strange ark atop the temple stairs.

"Hey guys, what do you think this card does?" asked Tristan, as they all looked to the temple.

"It allows me to seal one card from my hand inside it's ark, so it can be Tributed later!" Odion says, as if answering Tristan's question, and took one card from his hand – the card Brian and I knew to be the Winged Dragon of Ra. "Now, I will play Cup of Sealed Soul, and Seal of Serket. These cards allow me to summon one of my most trusted monsters: Mystical Beast of Serket!" From the two Spell cards materialized a new monster, which was scorpion like, had thorns running through its body, sharp pincers, several rows of teeth, and what looked like a Millennium Eye atop its head. It roared, and turned to face Yami's monster's.

"That bug doesn't look so tough! Yuge can defeat that thing, no prob!" Joey boasted, but Odion said that his monster wasn't what Yugi should be concerned about, but what power he will be able to unleash if the monster inside the ark breaks free.

"And what monster would that be?"

Kaiba scoffed. "Haven't you been able to figure it out yet, Wheeler? It's the third God card."

The gang gasped, and Odion merely nodded. "Yes, the Winged Dragon of Ra is sealed away, but not for long. But you're in luck, because since it was summoned with a ritual of my two Spell Cards, I can't make my monster attack this turn, so I'll just end my turn. So make your move, little Yugi, and let's find out how great the power of the Pharaoh really is!"

"What is the big deal about this card Marik has, anyway?" asked Mai.

"It must be a card with considerable power, for Marik to be making such a big deal of it." said Joey, looking on with a hopeful look on his face.

"In that case, I'll summon my Beta, the Magnet Warrior. Now, Dark Magician Girl, attack!"

The apprentice magician prepared to fire her attack, but before she could, Odion activated a Trap Card.

"I don't think so, Pharaoh. I activate the Eye of Wdjat. When a opponent declares an attack, I can turn that attack against one of your own monsters. And I chose the Celtic Guardian!"

Before Yami could react, Odion took control of the Dark Magician Girl, who fired the attack against the Celtic Guardian, destroying him, and dropping Yami's Life Points to 800.

"Man, that took a heavy blow to Yugi's game! Do you think he's okay?" asked Tea, looking concerned.

"He's fine, don't worry Tea!" said Duke.

"Yeah, don't forget, he's the King of Games!" said Brian, loud enough for Kaiba to hear it. Kaiba narrowed his eyes, and focused on the duel, but otherwise showed no signs of having heard my friend.

"You did that one on purpose, didn't you?" I whispered.

"You know I'll take every chance I can to annoy him!" he said, grinning.

I shook my head and sighed, but also turned my attention to the duel, where Yami had already recovered from the blow.

"I activate a Spell card from my hand, Red Medicine, which allows me to recover 500 life Points, and I end my turn." said Yami, as his Life points rose to 1300.

"Don't worry, Yugi, you'll get him back next turn!"

"I beg to differ. This monster is one of my most powerful ones, and you will soon find out why. Mystical Beast of Serket, attack Beta, the Magnet Warrior!"

The giant scorpion like creature obeyed, and grabbed Yami's monster with its pincers, held it up, and ate him. The reactions of everyone were various, from the indifference that Kaiba showed, to the looks of shock and horror that Yugi's friends had on their faces.

"And now, my monster will absorb its power, adding another 500 ATK." said Odion, as his monster grew a bit larger, and roared, hungry for more.

Yami looked at his hand, put two cards face down, set his Dark Magician Girl in defense mode, and ended his turn.

Odion merely glanced at his opponents field, before ordering his monster to attack. The gang could hardly watch, as one of Yami's most trusted monsters was eaten by the Mystical Beast of Serket, and it grew even more, raising its ATK to 3500. I could tell by Yami's face that it was hard for him to witness it, but he would never give up. As he drew his next card, a small smile appeared on his face. "Even though you defeated my Dark Magician Girl, her loss will not be in vain. Because of Magic Formula, I gain 1000 Life Points, bring them to a total of 1500. Now, I place a monster face down, and end my turn."

We all started to shout words of encouragement, but there was one of us was who seemed to have taken enough. Serenity turned away, and ran towards the elevator, and Joey ran after her.

"Wait Serenity! Where you goin'?"

"I can't watch this anymore!"

"Come on, sis! Yuge needs all of us here to support him! You have to stay and watch the rest of the duel! True, if it keeps going on like this, he could lose, but that's why were all here! So we can cheer him on, and so he can see this duel through! Remember, even though it was difficult for yah, you found your light in the darkness. No matter what happens, you have to face it!"

Joey's speech seemed to have done the trick, and Serenity returned with her brother to the rest of the gang. However, Serenity wasn't the only person struck by Joey's speech. Odion got a far off look on his eyes, as he remembered his childhood, from when he was just a baby being taken to live a life of cruelty and restraint, living underground with a seriously crazy father, never being able to be accepted as a Tombkeeper, up to the point when Marik was born, when the two of them were playing ancient egyptian basketball, when he killed the Ishtar family pet snake Cornelius, how he got punished for it, and finally, the dreadful day when Marik had to take the Tombkeeper's initiation. Apparently, my friend was thinking the same as me.

"That is one big flashback, huh?" he whispered.

"Yeah, but the worst part is the end. It is not right for the poor guys to have to sit trough a movie with CGI chihuahuas!" I answered him.

We were trying not to think much about it, but we both knew that the duel was drawing to a close, and with it, came one of the scariest moments in the entire season. I know it didn't sound like much when we were days from it happening, or when we were watching it on TV, but now that it was so close, the tension was about to pick up – and the game was about to become much more dangerous.

As Odion began to focus back on the present, he simply ordered his monster to attack, and it launched forward, preparing to devour its third victim. However, it seemed that Yami had prepared a surprise of his own, because it was revealed to be...

"Morphing Jar! And because of it's effect, we now have to discard our entire hand! Now I activate Pot of Greed, and draw two new cards!" Yami looked at his hand and smiled. "It looks like your time is up. All the pieces of the puzzle are now in place, and your fate has been sealed. I activate one of my face down cards, Premature Burial! By paying 800 Life Points, this lets me select one monster in my Graveyard, and Special Summon it in attack mode. And I choose Beta, the Magnet Warrior!" A card flipped open on Yami's side of the field, and a ghost came out of it, which began to take form to become the chosen monster. "And that's not all! I also activate Monster Reborn, bringing back another monster which was taken away by the effect of Morphing Jar: Gamma, the Magnet Warrior!" Another monster suddenly appeared next next to the first one, and stood facing the huge scorpion on the other side of the field.

"A fair move, but those monsters cannot even match my Mystical Beast of Serket."

"Perhaps, but they aren't the ones I will use to attack. Separate, they are excellent warriors, but together, they form a force that few can hope to match! I combine them with my Alpha, the Magnet Warrior, to form Valkyrion, the Magna Warrior!" A third warrior, similar to the other two, appeared for a short moment on the field, before combining with them, to for a new monster.

"As good as this new monster is, it's ATK is still low compared to the one Mystical Beast of Serket has. What is Yugi thinking?" said Kaiba.

"Now, I'll defuse them again, so all three monsters will be on the field." Valkyrion made a mechanical sound, as all the parts that he was made of detached themselves of him, rearranged themselves, and all three warriors appeared one again on the field. At the mention of the word "three", Seto's eyes widened in understanding.

"Why did Yugi do that?" asked Tristan. "Those three monsters don't stand a chance there!"

"Don't worry, I'm sure he has a plan!" said Brian.

"Prepare to experience a power like no other! I offer my three monsters on the field as tribute to summon the almighty Slifer, the Sky Dragon!" Yami then pulled a card from his hand, held it high, and slammed it down on his duel disk. Suddenly, the sky turned dark, and it began to thunder, as Yami's duel disk glowed, and a giant hologram of Slifer's card appeared on his field. The card then began to glow, and light shot upwards towards the sky, with two huge wings appearing on the side. The dragon then began to materialize, his body so big it wrapped around the blimp several times. It then lowered its head, and glared at Odion, letting out a big roar.

"Thanks to Slifer's special ability, its attack gets determined by how many cards I have in my hand. And since I have four, Slifer's ATK power is of 4000!" said Yami, as Slifer roared once more, showing of its power.

"Amazing!" said Tristan.

"Yeah, now Yuge has enough power with him to wipe Marik out for good!" said Joey.

"However, I won't make an attack."

"What?" asked everyone, even us, because we were surprised. Yami could destroy Odion's strongest monster, and that wasn't a move someone would pass up lightly.

"What are you thinking, Yugi? Attack!" said Kaiba.

Yami shook his head. "No, and I have a good reason. I only had a suspicion at first, but it became stronger and stronger as the duel progressed. I have battled Marik three times now, and all those times, he hid his face behind someone else, and let them do his dirty work – Bandit Keith, Strings, and even my best friend Joey." Joey was noticeably angrier with the memory of being forced to duel Yami against his will. "However, what I've seen out of you so far has made me certain that you are not Marik! So, I'll give you one more chance, before I end this duel!"

Marik was now visibly angrier to see that his plan was now on the brink of collapse. The Millennium Rod glowed once more, and Odion's eyes widened as he drew his next card. He seemed to be conflicted about using the card he drew earlier, but after a few moments, he made his decision.

Odion pulled out the fake Millennium Rod, and waved it at Yami, saying that only the real Marik would have it. Yami is still not convinced, replying that unlike Marik, Odion has dueled him with honor and respect.

"Very well, Pharaoh. If this is the only thing that can prove my point, I see no alternative." said Odion, raising the fake Rod. "I will now sacrifice my Mystical Beast of Serket, to summon my God Card, the Winged Dragon of Ra!"

"Be very careful, Yugi" said Brian.

"Yeah, nice advice..."

"What? Nobody else was gonna do it..." my friend said, shrugging.

Odion then turned to the ark. "I now offer my Mystical Beast of Serket, and half my Life Points, to summon the Winged Dragon of Ra, in the name of he next great Pharaoh, King Marik!"

The lid of the ark rose, and a beam of light shot out, reaching for the thundering sky above. Slifer roared as this happened, awaiting the monster that would face it. Huge claws emerged form the sky, through the clouds, and a huge golden dragon soon followed, looming over the playing field.

"The Mystical Beast of Serket absorbed three monsters, Gamma the Magnet Warrior, Dark Magician Girl, and Morphing Jar, thus making it's ATK 4000. Now, that power has been transferred to the Winged Dragon of Ra. Now, my God Card! Attack!"

Suddenly, all the Millennium items present started to glow at once. The fake Ra stayed in the same place, as if ignoring the order.

"_Oh, sweet mother of Osiris, it's gonna happen now..." _

"This is not good..."

Odion ordered it to attack again, but still nothing happened. The gang all start to wonder why Ra didn't do anything.

"It's very simple." said Yami, pointing at Odion, with his Millennium Puzzle glowing dangerously. "He isn't the real Marik!"

Kaiba seemed to still be find this argument hard to believe, but everyone was now focused on the sky, where it was now thundering even more now. All of a sudden, one of the thunderbolts hit an area to the far left of the dueling arena.

"Nyeh!" said Joey, jumping from surprise. "Man, that was close!"

Odion then bows his head, as more thunderbolts strike all around the arena now. Finally, one of them hits him, shattering his fake Millennium Rod. Everyone's eyes widen, as they realize that he really wasn't Marik, as Odion falls to the ground, and remains in the same place, unmoving. Concerned, Yami started to go to him, only to be struck by lighting himself. Everyone present gasped, as he too fell to the ground, and remained there.

Joey and Tristan start to run towards them, but Roland quickly stops them, saying that the duel was still in progress.

Joey and Tristan merely glared at the man. " We don't care! Yugi's our friend, and he needs our help!"

"The Duel Disks aren't programmed to do real damage, so they must have sustained some sort of mental injury. Like your friend from the duel earlier." Images of Bakura taking the blast from my Blue Eyes, and Ryou being unconscious afterward flashed trough my mind, and I lowered my head slightly, still feeling guilty.

"Who cares!" said May. "Just end the duel!"

Roland looked Kaiba, looking for instructions. "Since both duelists still have a few Life Points remaining, we can't disqualify either one. The first duelist who gets to his feet within five minutes, is declared the winner!"

"Then Yami'll win by default! Truly it shall be a victory for the forces of justice!" whispered Brian, making me laugh. Meanwhile, to our right, Marik was already showing signs of his decent into the darkness.

Joey says the whole idea is stupid, but Kaiba replies that it's the only option he is going to give them. Joey glared at him, but joined the gang in urging Yami to get back to his feet. In the arena, Odion was struggling to get up. Just when Roland was about to declare Odion the winner, however, he fell back down, and the two duelists remained tied.

With two minutes left to go, Yami's friends were beginning to get desperate. Suddenly, a faint glow came from the Millennium Puzzle, and slowly, Yami began to rise to his feet. When he finally got to his feet, the gang congratulated him, and told him that he had won the duel, for he seemed somewhat disoriented, but quickly recovered.

"The winner is Yugi Muto!" said Roland. Yugi's friends began to invade the arena to celebrate, but Yami noticed that Odion was still not moving, and headed towards him.

"Man, that was freaky..." said Joey, also looking over to Odion. "It was like his God card went nuts, or something!"

Kaiba looked at Odion also, but I could tell for different reasons. Duel Disks recognize any card in Duel Monsters, but it reacted in a weird way when Ra was summoned. The only logical reason is because the card was a fake.

"_That cannot be good publicity for KaibaCop, or the tournament..."_ I mused, as I focused my attention back on the fallen duelist, as my friend beside me seemed to wish to be anywhere else, but here.

"I... I'm sorry, Pharaoh." said Odion. "It was an honor for me to duel with you."

Yami nodded. "Same here. But, I must ask; if you're not the real Marik. Then who are you? And why would you go through all this trouble?"

"I... am only a servant of the real Master Marik." Odion answered, weakly pointing towards Marik, who was still clutching his head.

"That's Marik?" said Joey and Yami. Tea then noticed that Marik had a Millennium Rod, just like the fake one that Odion had.

"It's Kira!"

"And there's the obligatory Death Note reference... I never thought we'd sink that low..." said Brian, shaking his head. However, everyone was too focused on Marik now, so nobody seemed to notice us.

"Admit your true identity, Marik!"

Marik then turned to them, the pain on his head a minor concern at the moment. "That's right, you fools! I am Marik!"

"So Namu lied to us all along?"

"Namu? He was merely a disguise to get me closer to little Yugi!" said Marik. Yami remarked to Joey that he was the one who brainwashed him.

"_No, you think?"_

"At last I can finish the job that my pathetic servants couldn't! Yugi, your Puzzle and your power will soon be where they belong!" said Marik, his voice twisting a bit towards the end of his sentence. His face then twisted in pain, as the darkness within his heart grew stronger. Unable to control it any longer, Odion passed out, as the others continued to watch Marik struggle with his Yami. Finally, Marik let out a deafening scream towards the sky, clutching his head, and after a few moments, he finally lowered his head, his hair now spikier, and with a Millennium Eye glowing on his forehead.

"We're dead..." said Brian, looking like he had seen a ghost, and frankly, I couldn't agree more.

"I'm finally free again, which means I can do things my way. I was restrained for many years by that fool Odion."

"Who are you?"

"I'm the true Marik, and I'm not as kind as the one you've come to know. And soon, I'll finish the job he couldn't complete, and strip you of your powers!"

"_I don't really know why, but I suddenly had a weird flashback to "Leather Pants"... must be his clothing." _I thought.

"For I deserve to be Pharaoh, not you!" continued Yami Marik, looking straight at Yami. "And when I'm done with you, your power will be all mine, and you'll be trapped in a realm of eternal darkness!" now he looked straight at Yugi's friends, as well as towards us. "As well as your friends!"

"Hey, pal, get a life!" said Joey, not impressed.

"Thanks to Odion's failure, I now have a life! But wait... where are my manners? There is another I should be thanking! Pharaoh, thanks to you winning this duel, I'm now free to plunge the world into darkness!" said Yami Marik, throwing his head back in laughter. After a few moments he seemed to calm down. "Of course, in failing, Odion has proven that only people with a connection to the Ancient Egypt can control the Egyptian God cards." he said, looking at Kaiba, who in turn replied that he didn't believed in any of that Egyptian fairy tales, and the only reason he could control Obelisk was because he was a master duelist. Yami Marik then told Yami that the true battle for the Pharaoh's power would now begin, and walked past everyone, heading towards his room. Soon afterward, we all did the same, and hurried to make sure that Odion got to a hospital bed.

_x_

Now inside one of the hospital rooms available, we all looked at Odion, who was being looked after by a doctor. Over the intercom, we heard that the next duel would take place in fifteen minutes. Joey asked the medic how Odion was, and he replied that, although his tests are fine, the mental stress he went through left him unconscious. Brian and I told them that we would be right back, and headed to our room to discuss the latest developments. As we arrived, my friend began pacing the room, worried about the next duel.

"Don't worry, you have the same probability of facing Melvin in this tournament as the rest of us. Well, except for Yugi, he has 100% chance of facing him. It's what the season has been building up to, after all." I said, trying to comfort him.

Brian looked at me, a small smile on his face. "Actually, the season has been building up for Yami to face Marik, not his imaginary friend Melvin. And, in any case, what if I end up facing hm in the next duel? Like you said, we don't know what the matchup is anymore!"

"Then you do what you always did! You fight with all your might, and if for some freak chance you end up losing, then make sure to make as much damage as possible on him!" I replied, holding out my fist, which he hit with his. "Besides, if there's anybody in this room who stands a chance against him, it's you! You beat him way more times than me back home!"

"I guess..."

"All duelists, please report to the main hall. It's time to chose the participants of the next duel!" said Roland from a nearby intercom. We exchanged a look, nodded to each other, and left the room to join the others. On the way, we heard Joey and Yami, who were still in Odion's room, discussing the last moments of the last duel.

"Hey, Yuge, what happened when you got struck by all those thunderbolts?"

"It's hard to say. All I remember was everything going dark, and I saw some people. Their face were covered by shadows, but they seemed familiar... I tried to get up, but suddenly, I saw everyone by my side, helping me up. I felt the strength of all my friends, just like when I dueled Pegasus in Duelist Kingdom."

"Man, this tournament is getting weirder and weirder... but don't worry, pal, no matter what happens, we will always be there for yah!" Yami nodded, and we all walked to the main room, were the Blue Eyes Ultimate Bingo Machine was already rolling.

"Hey, Marik's not here yet, and there still hasn't been any sign of the eight duelist." stated Mai.

"Hey, Kaiba, since Marik entered under a fake name, shouldn't he be disqualified?"

"Wishful thinking, Wheeler! This contest is about skill, not names! You should be man enough to get rid of the competition with your deck, not some trivial technicality!"

"Okay, Roland, start the machine!" ordered Mokuba. Roland nodded, and the numbers inside the machine started rolling. After a few moments, the first one was revealed to be...

"Number 4!"

Joey cheered for Mai, but she ignored him, and turned to go.

"Wait Mai. Don't you wanna know who you'll be facin'?"

"It doesn't matter who it is, I'll win either away! I'll see you all in the finals." May replied, not even looking back. Joey said they'll be there rooting for her, but she told them not to bother, that a certain blonde headed knucklehead was beginning to get on her nerves, and that she and Joey were not friends, and stormed out.

The next number to be selected was ...

"Number 5! Marik Ishtar has been selected, and must report to the dueling arena immediately!"

We all got on the elevator that led to the dueling platform. Once we got there, we saw that Mai was already there, and Yami Marik was still nowhere to be seen.

"Finally! A duel that goes like the anime intended!"

"Yeah, but I'm still wondering one thing... where do you think Melvin got the new clothes? I mean, I can understand the cloak, it's a Rare Hunter cloak, but where did the new shirt come form?" whispered Brian.

"I once heard a theory about that... His shirts were once all like that, but one day, one of the Steves screwed up the laundry, and the shirts shrank, and turned into a lighter color... He liked the new look, and kept it!" I answered.

My friend tried to hold back his laughter. "I guess it makes sense..."

At that moment, Yami Marik arrived from one of the elevators, saying that the duel wouldn't take long, and took his place on the side of the arena opposite to Mai's, and they start their duel.

_x_

**(AN: Since this duel goes just like the one in the anime, I didn't think it would be all that much I could do that would make it different, so, I'll skip to the end of the duel, after Yami Marik has won.) **

The duel was now over. Yami Marik had ordered Ra to attack, and despite Yami's and Joey's best efforts to protect her, Mai lost the duel, and her mind got sent to the Shadow Realm. As Mai's body collapsed on the arena, Joey turned to Yami Marik and demanded to know what he did to her.

"Your friend made a costly mistake dueling against me. Now I'm afraid she's paying the ultimate price. Notice her motionless appearance? That's because her mind is trapped!" said Yami Marik.

"Say what?"

"With each passing second, she forgets more, and the shadows are taking everything, Wheeler; her family, her friends, everything she kept inside her mind, and inside her heart!" replied Yami Marik, laughing.

"That's it, Marik! Now you've gone too far! So it's go time, so put 'im up, cowboy!" said Joey, just about ready to make Marik know how he felt about the whole situation.

"Fool! Threaten me again, and you'll meet a fate similar to your friend!"

Tea then asked Joey to just let it go, as Yami Marik walked passed us all, and headed downstairs.

"She's right man! This creep's psychotic!" said Tristan.

"_I'm not sure that would be the wisest thing for him to say, considering Yami Marik is a few feet away..."_

The gang then began to urge Mai, and Yami to return to consciousness, but so far to no avail. After a few moments, however, Yami managed to get back on his feet.

"Are you alright?"

"Don't worry, I'm fine. But are you and Mai OK?" Yami asked Joey, who said that he was fine, but Mai wasn't doing so well, that Marik had done something with the Millennium Rod, and that her brain was trapped in the shadows.

To our right however, Kaiba got a call from his brother, saying that there was more written on the Winged Dragon of Ra's card than the chant, and that he was decoding it.

"_That is so cool... It's like he's wearing K.I.T.T., from Knight Rider!" _

"Good work, I need to know all the secrets of that card." He then turned to all present, and ordered another 15 minute break, before the next duelists would be decided, so everyone returned downstairs, and Mai was put in a hospital bed, like Odion. Me and Brian, however, went towards our room to discuss the latest developments.

"Three duels into the semifinals, and three people have been hospitalized! Do you think there's a connection?" asked Brian.

"Hey, c'mon! Ryou is hospitalized because of our duel!"

"Actually, to be fair, most of that had to be from the wound Bakura inflicted in him. It wasn't a Shadow Duel, so the damage wasn't all that real. At least he wasn't hit by Slifer, the Executive Producer this time..."

"I guess..."

Just then, we were told to report to the main hall again, so that the next duel could be determined. We all met there, just as the remaining numbers started to roll. After a few minutes, a number rolled out of one of the heads of the Blue Eyes Ultimate Dragon machine, and it was...

"Number two!"

Joey began to get all hyped up, almost too impatient to see who his opponent would be. After what seemed like forever, the machine dropped another number, and the second duelist was...

"Number nine!"

Brian couldn't believe his ears. It took him a few moments to realize that he would be dueling his favorite duelist, but when finally dawned on him, he couldn't be happier.

**And that's it for this chapter. I made it extra long, to make up for the year long absence. Again, sorry! **

**Also, just something I wanna point out, I know Nina said the Gravekeeper's deck was only obtainable on a Yami Marik deck, but I realize that that's not true. What I meant was that it's the easiest way to obtain all the cards that I mentioned. I know there are booster packs that have some, if not all the cards, but the easiest way is the Structure Deck. That, and it makes it easier to make another Thiefshipping joke! :D**

**In any case, I hope I got the character of Odion down. I know he doesn't exactly act like that, but he was supposed to act like Marik, so I thought this way would be better. I hope you liked this chappie, and remember, reviews and advice are always welcome! **


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